A woman hurled a slipper at Partha Chatterjee, former education minister, now in the custody of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for alleged corruption in school recruitments
On Tuesday, when Chatterjee was being taken out of ESI Hospital in Joka after his health check-up, the slipper came flying. It missed Chatterjee, who had by then boarded the car that had brought him from CGO Complex in Salt Lake to the hospital. The slipper hit a rear window.
The woman, identified as Shubhra Ghorui, is a resident of Amtala in South 24-Parganas district. She said came to get medicines for a relative but lost her cool on seeing Chatterjee “being treated like a VIP”.
“Aamar raag sadharan manusher-er, protyek-er raag (My anger represents the common man’s rage),” Shubhra said. “He has cheated so many candidates by promising them jobs and made ₹50 crores. He was brought in an air-conditioned car for a medical check-up. Why? He should have been dragged down with a noose around his neck,” she said.
Chatterjee was arrested from his home at Naktala in south Kolkata on July 23 and will be produced in court on Wednesday.
“I had come to hit him with my slippers and I have done that,” Shubhra, told reporters outside the ESI hospital.
The woman, whose only daughter is preparing for her Class XII exams, said she would have been happier “if the slipper had landed on Partha’s head”.
Sources in the hospital said Shubhra has been visiting the hospital since last week to see one of her relatives.
A police officer who visited Amtala to collect information about her said: “Neighbours said they never saw the woman angry or quarrelling with anyone.”
Arpita Mukherjee too was brought to the hospital on Tuesday. “The money was kept in my flats in my absence,” she told reporters. ED officials said they were not ready to buy her claims.
