The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Odisha Police has arrested two more persons in connection with the Rs 4-crore LED bulb and scholarship fraud by the Vastav India Trust.

The arrested were identified as Nishant Prakash Jaiswal and Amar Danish, the respective State field officer and project in-charge of Vastav India Trust for Odisha. The duo was arrested from Ranchi in Jharkhand.

The accused were produced before the JMFC Court in Ranchi and brought to Bhubaneswar on transit remand. They were produced before the OPID Court in Cuttack on Wednesday.

This case is the outcome of an inquiry conducted by the EOW on a petition of one Sebati Mahanta and others against the Vastav India Trust. The allegation was against the president, secretary, CMD and project in-charge of the organisation for duping the public and parents on the pretext of selling or supplying LED bulbs in their solar awareness programme and giving pre-Matric scholarship to the students in their ‘Chuuloo Aasman’ programme to the tune of Rs 4 crore.

Subsequently, the trust officials disappeared by closing down their offices. The Vastav India Trust registered with Sub-Registrar, Ranchi, opened an office at Bomikhal in Bhubaneswar in March 2022.

The arrested accused Amar Danish and Nishant Prakash Jaiswal being the respective project in-charge and State field officer of the said trust, in connivance with others launched two programmes on solar awareness and pre-Matric scholarship namely Chuuloo Aasman under solar awareness programme, they used to collect Rs 1,650 in cash from each applicant as member fee with assurance to supply them with LED bulbs.

The survey application form so provided by the trust was containing the logo of the Ministry of MSME, which was forged in order to win the trust of the people. In their pre-Matric scholarship program named “Chuuloo Aasman”, the trust was offering scholarship of Rs 1,000 per month up to 24 months on their one-time deposit of Rs 3,000 as membership charge.

The scholarship amount was payable to the bank account opened in the names of the parents of the concerned students. This way, the trust collected Rs 4 crore from more than 3,500 persons.