Kolkata, August 16
Aftar Singh, husband of CPM MP Jyotirmoyee Sikhdar, was arrested today from Salt Lake for allegedly running a brothel.
Nine others — four girls and five youths — were also arrested on the charge of indulging in immoral activities from the hotel the MP owns.
Aftar Singh, Mrs Sikhdar’s coach who later became her husband, is an athlete hailing from Punjab and built the hotel in sector 5 at Salt Lake on a plot allotted to his wife from the Chief Minister’s VIP quota after her victory in the Asiad.
Mrs Sikhdar who has been much close to former Chief Minister Jyoti Basu and current Sports Minister Subhas Chakraborty won the Krishnanagar seat in the recent Lok Sabha elections by defeating the BJP candidate, Mr Satyabrata Mukherjee.
Aftar Singh’s arrest has created stir both at Alimuddin Street, the CPM party office, and political circles in the state.
Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee declared the law would take its own course. He said Aftar Singh would be produced in court in due course.
Mrs Sikhdar is in Delhi to attend the ongoing session of Parliament. The police will interrogate her in connection with running the hotel-cum-bar which did not have any licence either from the Salt Lake municipality or the Excise Department, said a senior police official at Salt Lake thana.
According to police investigations, the house which Mrs Sikhdar initially built for residential purposes three years ago on the land allotted under the VIP quota, had later been used as a brothel.
A police party led by the local SDPO last night raided the hotel and caught nine persons, including four women, indulging in immoral activities. The MP’s husband was later arrested from the Salt Lake area.
