'Min's arrest will not affect Naktala Udayan Sangha Club's Puja'

KOLKATA: The Puja committee at Naktala Udayan Sangha Club on Sunday said that Durga Puja will be organised in a grand manner and it will not be affected by the arrest of state minister Partha Chatterjee.

After the arrest of the former state Education Minister on Saturday, questions were being raised as to whether the club will be able to deliver with the same vigor as in the last few years.

The club's Puja, year after year, has been considered as one of the popular ones in the city.

Chatterjee lives hardly 150 meters away from the club. He is one of the 500 members.

For the past many years, he has been personally supervising the Puja taking place in the ground next to the club's office.

He along with his aide Arpita Mukherjee were arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday in connection with money laundering. At Mukherjee's flat, ED found over Rs 21 crore and is currently probing the case.

The club has stood to its point that his arrest will have no impact on the Puja organised by the club since the 1980s.

According to a member, the Puja has been organised years before Chatterjee's name became associated with it. "It is a club-based Puja. The Puja will be held and our general secretary Anjan Das will be present," the member said.

The general secretary Das said that Chatterjee has been a minister for 11 years while the Puja has been taking place for 38 years. Thus, there is no question of his arrest affecting the Puja. Although, according to him, many might try to drag their name into a controversy.

However, it is not decided yet whether the minister's face will appear on the club's hoardings this time.