Shall I get back my hard-earned moneyIJ The question echoes across Odisha even as Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has announced setting up a Judicial Commission to probe into the financial frauds committed by a large number of chit fund companies.
As there is no guarantee that the investors will get back their money, widespread chaos prevails in the State.
The chit fund companies, which were mostly confined to the northern parts the State, now have their operations in all the 30 districts. And interestingly, the coastal district of Baleswar has emerged as a haven for chit fund business.
Beginning with the Kolkata-based Saradha Group, different companies have set up their offices in Baleswar.Of the total 177 cases so far registered in the State, 48 are from Baleswar district followed by 16 from Jajpur, 13 from Mayurbhanj and 10 from Jagatsinghpur district. Thirty-two of the 34 police districts have reported existence of chit fund companies.
Incidentally, Odisha is not the lone State which has been hit by the chit fund frauds. The neighbouring West Bengal also experienced such fraud and its Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has announced setting up a corpus fund to return money to the genuine investors.
However, in case of Odisha, the State Government has no such plan as Finance Minister Prasanna Acharya informed. "So far, the State Government has no plan for setting up any corpus fund." But he added that the Government was taking steps to ensure that people get back their money.
The State Government has, in the meantime, taken certain steps and there have been raids on chit fund and money circulation companies. The police and Crime Branch sleuths have seized documents from such companies and sealed their offices.
But what are the people in general going to get, asked Dibakar Nayak, a former school teacher. Nayak has invested Rs 5 lakh of his retirement money in a chit fund company. like him, many poor people have invested their hard-earned money in different companies.
The policymakers in the State administration have apparently failed to read the pulse of the people. People at least want an assurance from the Government that they will get back their investment amounts.
But the State Government has provided no such assurance. Though the Chief Minister has announced a Judicial Commission to probe into the chit fund scams, the Government has not infused confidence among people. That is probably one of the reasons why three victims of the scams have by now committed suicide in the State.
The opposition parties, mostly Congress and the BJP, have already rejected the Government's decision of setting up a Judicial Commission.
"A Judicial Commission is mostly set up when the culprits are unknown. Here is a case of the chit fund scam; all know who the culprits are. Therefore, it requires a thorough investigation and not an inquiry," pointed out senior BJP leader Bijay Mohapatra.
The Congress has made it a political issue and demanded a CBI probe. Union Minister Srikant Jena, former PCC president Niranjan Patnaik and present PCC chief Jayadev Jena have been regularly harping on the issue and demanding an assurance from the State Government that people will get back their money.
The chit fund scam has, in fact, now emerged as a bigger political issue against the Government than other scams involving far more amounts of money since the chit fund scam has hit common people directly as their lives' entire
savings are at serious risk. Small time investors, mostly people of middle class, who make or break any Government, are the victims here.
However, Chief Minister and BJD president Naveen Patnaik does not seem to be seriously concerned about the people's plight. This is more significant in the light of the statement of the tainted company Artha Tatwa (AT) Group's CMD Pradip Sethy that he had support of some Ministers and BJD MlAs in running his business.
Meanwhile, a file photograph of Health Minister Damodar Rout seen in close company of Pradip Sethy has been published in a section of the media, obviously as a proof of the ruling party's patronage to the AT Group chief, who is now in jail.
The photo shows that Sethy was being honoured as a best youth leader of cooperation movement when Rout was the Minister of Cooperation.
So far as the investigation part of the scam is concerned, there is no such systematic approach to it. While the Crime Branch police are probing into the Saradha and other chit fund cases, the Commission of Police continues to deal with the cases related to the Artha Tatwa Group
"This Khichdi probe is creating confusion," said a former DGP, adding that the culprits could get benefit out of this type of approach adopted by the Government.
In such a situation, the BJD Government has only to boast of the Odisha Protection of Interests of Depositors (Financial Institutions) Bill-2011.
"If the Bill gets the President's ascent, we will be able to arrange return of money to the people," the Minister Finance recently claimed, referring to the pending of the Bill at the Rashtrapati Bhavan for more than a year.
Unless the chit fund investors are not made confident about getting back their money, the scam would certainly have its major impact on the elections in 2014. The ruling BJD could face the music if the Government continues to ignore the sentiments of the people, feel political observers.