Calcutta, Nov. 16: Duncans Industries chairman G.P. Goenka was today questioned by the CID in connection with a case relating to non-payment of workers' salary arrears in one of the company's tea gardens in north Bengal.

Sources said Goenka had told CID officers that he was not involved in the company's daily affairs and had assigned the responsibility of making payments to some of his employees.

The Duncans chief arrived at the CID headquarters at Bhavani Bhavan around 10.50am and was taken to the visitors' room on the fourth floor, where the office of the agency's additional director-general of police is located.

Sources said Goenka had to wait for 15 minutes in a room and was then taken to the special superintendent's office on the third floor.

He was questioned by special superintendent Shib Shankar Rudra till 12.10pm, the sources said.

"He told us that he had directed his employees responsible for looking after the payment system to find out the reasons behind the non-payment of dues in a north Bengal tea garden," a CID officer said. "Goenka said he would send the employees concerned to our office."

Goenka, the sources said, assured the officers that he would "co-operate" with them whenever he was called.

In an FIR lodged by Dilwar Subba, a labourer working in the group's Runglee Rungliot tea garden, the names of Goenka and his son Srivardhan were mentioned as accused.

According to a CID source, Subba alleged that the Goenkas did not pay employees' dues after last year's increment. Runglee Rungliot is in Darjeeling.