A detailed account of the chargesheet also points to a financial trail. According to the CBI’s reconstruction, Rs 30 lakh was allegedly handed over on 24 February in Jamtara, Jharkhand, as part of the conspiracy. Investigators have also alleged that money was subsequently distributed among people involved in the operation and used for vehicles and other logistics.
That figure is significantly different from the Rs 2 crore that Adhikari has now publicly claimed was spent on the killing.
More importantly, the publicly reported details of the chargesheet do not establish a direct link to Abhishek Banerjee.
The CBI has, however, said it was probing possible political links. According to reports on the chargesheet, investigators found that some of the accused had ‘links with the Opposition camp’ and were in contact with political functionaries. Those allegations and lines of investigation do not by themselves establish that Abhishek Banerjee or the TMC leadership ordered or financed Rath’s killing.
Rath’s mother enters political contest
Hasirani Rath has herself expressed suspicion about the circumstances surrounding her son’s death and has echoed the belief that the ābhaipo gangā was involved.
Her decision to enter electoral politics is entirely her own, but the circumstances mean that a personal tragedy has now become part of a high-stakes electoral contest.
Political observer Sujit Chatterjee said the development raises a broader democratic question about the use of grief and unresolved criminal cases during election campaigns. “The BJP’s decision to field a bereaved mother is entirely lawful, and she has her own political history and agency,” he said. “But placing a bereaved mother at the centre of a campaign while the precise motive for her son’s murder remains unresolved inevitably creates a powerful emotional narrative.”
“The political question is whether the focus will remain on obtaining answers or whether the murder will primarily become an electoral symbol,” he added.
Questions from Adhikari’s political past
The Rath murder has also revived scrutiny of other deaths involving people who had worked closely with Adhikari.
Pradip Jha, who served as Adhikari’s personal assistant and political secretary when he was a TMC MP, was found unconscious on Strand Road in Kolkata in August 2013 and declared dead at Medical College and Hospital.
In 2018, Subhabrata Chakraborty, a member of Adhikari’s security detail, was found dead at a police barracks in Contai with a gunshot wound to the head. The death was initially treated as a suicide involving his service revolver. His wife subsequently sought a fresh investigation, alleging that he had been murdered, following which the CID took over the probe in 2021.
The cases are separate and there is no established evidence linking those deaths to Rath’s murder. But their recurrence has prompted questions about whether earlier investigations were sufficiently exhaustive and whether any outstanding issues in those cases warrant renewed scrutiny.
About the Author
