The Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered inclusion of the Artha Tatwa (AT) and Seashore chit fund companies in the list of firms to be probed despite objections by the counsel representing the State Government during the hearing on the PIl filed by social activist Alok Jena.
While Jena’s counsel Suresh Tripathy submitted a list of 11 chit fund companies to be referred to the CBI, his State Government counterpart Subhashish Mishra presented a list of 37 companies which excluded Artha Tatwa and Seashore. Mishra said these companies were operating within the State and the volume of their business was small compared to others.
However, the court upheld Tripathy’s arguments and ordered inclusion of the two companies for probe. A total 43 chit fund firms operating in Odisha have been enlisted by the court.The court also asked the State Government’s counsel to submit details on the estimated amount of money involved in the scam, copies of all chargesheets as well as the number of depositors affected by it by April 2, the next date of hearing.
The court also asked the Government’s counsel if the probe done by the Government had been able to establish any larger conspiracy behind the chit fund fraud and, if so, submit its report on the same.The State Government’s chief counsel in the case Gopal Subramaniam was not present during the hearing, and the court was informed that he would also not be available on April 2. The court, however, fixed the next date of hearing on April 2 and the date of final hearing on April 9.