The West Bengal government on Thursday removed Partha Chatterjee, who has been arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a school jobs scam, from the ministry with immediate effect.

“Partha Chatterjee, minister in charge, department of industry, commerce and enterprises, department of information technology and electronics, department of parliamentary affairs and department of public enterprises and industrial reconstruction, is hereby relieved of his duties as MIC of the aforesaid department with immediate effect,” an official order said.

Also read: Cash, gold, dollars and more: A look at Partha Chatterjee and Arpita Mukherjee’s loot

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee later said at a government event here that she will look after the portfolios held by Chatterjee for the time being.

The ED had arrested Chatterjee, who is also the Trinamool Congress secretary-general, on July 23 in connection with its investigation into alleged irregularities in the recruitment drives by the School Service Commission (SSC).

The central agency has also arrested Chatterjee’s close associate Arpita Mukherjee, and seized crores of rupees from her houses in different parts of the city.

Also read: Enforcement Directorate: Key role of this economic crime-fighting agency

Meanwhile, nameplate of former minister Partha Chatterjee was removed from outside his cabin in Nabanna, Howrah.

About Rs 29 crore in cash, five kilograms of jewellery and gold bars have been recovered from Mukherjee’s flat, the second to be raided since 22 July, a day before her arrest.

Also read: Partha Chatterjee arrest: Trinamool won’t interfere, says party spokesman

As many as three note-counting machines were used by ED officials to count the mountains of money. Speaking to a news organisation, an ED official said, “We have recovered a huge amount of money from one of the flats in a housing complex… Besides cash, gold bars, jewellery and other documents have also been recovered.”

The keys to the flat at ClubTown Heights were not to be found and the ED officers reportedly had to break into two other houses linked to Mukherjee. The searches were carried out after the minister’s aide provided information to the probe agency during the investigation following the arrests.