The CBI on Tuesday arrested BJD lok Sabha member Ram Chandra Hansdah along with former party MlA Subarna Naik, and former BJP leader Hitesh Kumar Bagarti, also an ex-MlA, in connection with a chit fund scam and for duping thousands of investors through a company founded by them.
All the three are founder directors of Nabadiganta Capital Services — which ran the chit fund company — and allegedly cheated a large number of investors by diverting the company’s funds for their personal gains.Earlier, the agency had searched the premises of Hansdah, the two former MlAs and other directors of the company on July 31. During the searches on Hansdah’s residence in Mayurbhanj district, the CBI had recovered Rs28 lakh in cash besides other documentary materials.
Hansdah and the two former MlAs were summoned to the CBI office in Bhubaneswar for interrogation and arrested after a few hours later, official sources said, adding they were not cooperating in the investigation and their custodial interrogation is required to unravel the entire conspiracy.Soon after Hansdah and Naik were arrested, the BJD suspended them from the party.
The State BJP said Bagarti was no longer a member of the party. “We have not renewed the membership of Bagarti, ex-MlA from Khariar, much before his arrest,” State BJP spokesman Sajan Sharma said in Bhubaneswar.The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the CBI arrested them for alleged criminal conspiracy, cheating and diversion of funds, CBI sources said. The agency had earlier arrested sitting BJD MlA and chief whip Pravat Tripathy in another chit fund scam case.
On October 26, the agency arrested the CMD of the dubious company Anjan Baliarsing, directors Pradeep Patnaik and Kartik Parida in connection with the case registered against the Group.Nabadiganta Capital Services is one of the 44 companies under the scanner of the investigating agency for its alleged involvement in the multi-crore chit fund scam in Odisha. The CBI has registered as many as 44 cases to probe the chit fund scam in the State.
During interrogation by the SIT sleuths, these politicians who were on the board of governors of the company had claimed that they had resigned from the firm as directors in 2012, but the resignations were accepted only last year.
The trio had pleaded innocence and alleged that they had been framed by the chit fund company but the Nabadiganta CMD had retorted saying, “The leaders are not children who can be framed. I have submitted all evidence to the CBI relating to their involvement in the company affairs.”
Acting at the behest of the Supreme Court, CBI has formed a SIT headed by Joint Director Rajeev Singh to probe the chit fund scam cases including those by the Saradha Group in West Bengal and scores of others such companies in Odisha, Assam and Tripura. The SIT is also probing the role of regulatory bodies like the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and Reserve Bank of India (RBI) whose negligence is suspected to have helped in mushrooming of chit fund companies in recent years.
In New Delhi, the BJP accused the ruling BJD in Odisha for “breeding corruption” during its rule in the state for years after CBI arrested Hansdah and Naik. “The speed with which BJD MPs and MlAs are being arrested for their complicity in Odisha chit fund scam, it only points to the fact that the termites of corruption over a period of time hollowed the party and today their fort is on the verge of collapse in Odisha,” BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said. “BJD is breeding corruption during its regime in the State,” he alleged.