The police have arrested two persons, including a woman, for allegedly duping more than 200 residents of Devnagar in Sitaramdera of over `1 crore by promising attractive returns against the deposits in a private bank.
The accused — Puja Devi (32) and Mohan Kumar (34), the residents of Devnagar — had set up a branch of Durgapur-based private bank called Reliable Bank, at Devnagar in the year 2009, and enticed the locals to deposit money to the bank for an attractive returns.
According to sources, the two accused attracted investors on the promise that the money will be doubled in five years, leading about 200 residents to continue to deposit money in the bank. Puja and Mohan would manage the transaction of the depositors, but when the maturity term of five years was over, they closed the branch of the private bank last year and refused to pay back the money of the depositors as promised,
Sources said since most of the depositors were daily wagers and illiterate they lost their hard-earned money ranging from Rs 22,000 to over Rs one lakh. One of the depositors, Ramesh Prasad said that recently they had staged a demonstration in front of the office of senior superintendent of police, Anoop T Mathew seeking the action in the case.
later, depositors came to the senior SP office and demonstrated, demanding their money back and a strict action against the accused. Sushil Chowdhury, officer-in-charge, Sitaramdera, assured protesters of the action against accused.
On the advice of the officer-in-charge, the protestors caught Puja Devi and Mohan Kumar and handed them over to the Sitaramdera police station in the afternoon. The officer has informed that two persons including a woman have so far been arrested in the case.
"We have initiated a probe into the case," said the police officer.