Another fraud case of Rs37 crore has been levelled against the Hi-Tech Group managing director Tirupati Pandigrahi and two others.
As many as 311 prospective flat buyers of the Hi-Tech Paradise Residential Project located near Uttara on the city outskirts on Sunday told reporters here that in 2013, they had booked flats at Hi-Tech Paradise initiated by Hi-Tech Edifice Pvt ltd with an agreement for possession of flats in 2014.
“Meanwhile, 38 months have elapsed, and the builder is yet to provide flats to us even after collecting more than Rs37 crore from 311 flat buyers which is more than 58 per cent of the entire project cost,” said Hi-Tech Paradise Owners’ Welfare Association president Amit Das.
He alleged that Hi-Tech Edifice Pvt ltd managing director Tirupati Panigrahi, executive director Tirupati Choudhury and director Madhusudan Panigrahi were pleading absurd excuse in this regard.
“On May 14, 2014, a complaint was lodged against Tirupati Panigrahi at the EOW of the Crime Branch seeking justice. But nothing tangible has happened as yet. Though we have written to the CM, the Governor, the Chief Justice of India in this respect, nothing tangible has happened as yet,” said Das.
Following the registration of the case, on October 18 last year, Tirupati Panigrahi had called a meeting of the buyers and asked them to pay Rs30,000 each to resume the project. “When we opposed, he refused to give us the flats,” said association vice-president Bipin Kumar Sahu.
Notably, Panigrahi is now on bail after being arrested in a similar fraud case. The EOW had arrested Panigrahi and two directors Tirupati Choudhury and Madhusudan Panigrahi on fraud charges.
On February 21, 2014, Tirupati Panigrahi was granted a conditional bail by the Supreme Court ordering him to deposit Rs63.5 crore within three weeks to repay the duped investors. However, Panigrahi sought more time from the court to deposit the money in instalments.
It was on April 22 this year that Panigrahi deposited the final instalment of Rs13.5 crore in the Supreme Court’s treasury.