Odisha CM Mohan Majhi Confesses Falling Prey To Chit Fund Scam Twice

Bhubaneswar: Chief Minister Mohan Majhi on Tuesday claimed that he was a victim of chit fund scams in 1990 and 2002.

“A government and private firm had duped me. I arranged and deposited money but later I did not find the companies…I could not get the money back as the process of recovering was too cumbersome and lengthy,” he said while addressing a gathering on National Consumer Day at the Lokseva Bhawan here.

He mentioned about fly-by-night operators, who lured individuals promising hefty returns, and urged people to be aware of the activities of Ponzi firms to save their hard-earned money.

The CM lauded the BJP-led government at the Centre for amending Chit Funds Act, 1982, in 2019. and putting in place mechanisms to ensure transparency in chit fund schemes. “Under the supervision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, all the loopholes in the law were plugged,” he said.

At least 44 companies, including Kolkata-based Saradha Group, and Odisha-based Seashore and Artha Tatwa groups, were probed by the CBI following a Supreme Court directive in May 2014. The chit fund firms had reportedly collected around Rs 4,600 crore from people in the state over a period of four years.

The previous BJD government led by Naveen Patnaik had formed a commission and set up a Rs 300 crore-corpus fund in 2013 to refund the duped small depositors. The commission headed by Justice MM Das had identified around 100,000 small depositors, who lost Rs 10,000 or less. 

In September, the CM told the Odisha Assembly that around 2 lakh small investors, affected by the scam, have already got their money back. The authorities have confiscated 1,472.428 decimals of immovable properties of 35 illegal financial institutions in Odisha, he added.