New Delhi, Dec 16 (IANS): Stepping up action in Assam ponzi scam cases, the CBI has filed five more charge sheets in five separate cases against 18 accused, including two companies, an official said on Monday.
Apart from the 16 people, two organisations -- Upepithets Holdings Pvt. Ltd (UHPL) and Brahmaputra Sanchay & Biniyog Cooperative Society Ltd (BSBCSL) -- were also named in the charge sheets filed in Special CBI Court, Guwahati.
These five charge sheets filed by CBI Guwahati are apart from four chargesheets filed by CBI Delhi which too is investigating the Assam Ponzi Investment Scam cases.
In one of the chargesheets, the federal agency named three accused including two private persons and a private company.
This is one of the Assam investment scam cases which are being investigated by CBI on the request of the government of Assam.
Before the CBI re-registered the case, it was registered by Police Station Tezpur, Assam, on September 4 against one of the accused Hemen Rava on allegations that the accused engaged in a financial scam in contravention of RBI/SEBI guidelines.
It was alleged that he induced the general public to enter notarised loan agreements with promises of high returns on investments. He allegedly misappropriated the funds for his personal gains, thereby defrauding his clients, the CBI alleged.
The investigation by the CBI has established that the accused were involved in orchestrating an illegal deposit scheme that solicited funds from investors under false pretence.
They used deceptive means, including notarised stamp papers, to lure investors with the promise of guaranteed monthly returns of 6 per cent and above.
Another charge sheet was filed against five accused, including four private persons and Brahmaputra Sanchay & Biniyog Cooperative Society Ltd.
Other accused are -- Jiten Deka, the then Chairman, Indrani Das, Branch Manager, Azara Branch, Sanjib Deka, Secretary, Himangshu Talukdar, Chairman, of the Society.
The case pertains to deposits collected by the cooperative society under the scheme named “Grihalakshmi”.
The investors were allegedly lured with promises of substantial returns such as bonus/interest.
Subsequently, the deposits were allegedly misappropriated by the accused.
It was revealed during investigation that accused Jiten Deka and other accused promoted an unregulated deposit scheme and made false promises of high return up to 15 per cent annually.
Jiten Deka and others solicited agents/investors to the scheme (unregulated deposit scheme) where agents were offered commission ranging from 4 per cent to 7 per cent on the deposited amounts.
In a separate case, the CBI filed a charge sheet against four private persons namely Mainao Brahma, Dipankar Bhatta, Jyotisman Sarma and Sumit Barman before the Special CBI Court.
The accused had allegedly entered a conspiracy to run an unregulated deposit scheme with the intention to defraud the general public and then divert/misappropriate the money.
All the accused are in judicial custody.
The CBI also filed a charge sheet against two persons - Rishiraj Gogoi and Joy Modak - before the Special CBI Court in Guwahati. The accused are in judicial custody.
The charge sheet said the accused were involved in running a stock trading business in the guise of their Company "Go Millions LLP" formed for selling various cosmetics and other products.
They induced the general public to invest money by promising them high returns by violating the guidelines of the SEBI/RBI and thus cheated the public by misappropriating money.
Investigation established that Gogoi and Modak entered a conspiracy, made an arrangement to collect deposits from the general public by way of business through UPI/Bank Account but did not deposit the amount in any Regulated Deposit Scheme. All the accused are in Judicial Custody.
Further, the CBI filed charges against four persons - Sankar Kumar Biswas, Rofiqul Islam, Dinesh Ch. Ray and Niranjan Kumar Malakar - before the Special CBI Court, Guwahati.
This case was re-registered by the CBI after taking over the investigation of Police Station, Dhubri.
The investigation established that the accused collected investment in the name of Titan Capital Market and did not deposit/invest/trade the amount received from the different depositors with any Regulated Deposit Scheme.
They cheated the depositors by collecting money from them for investments and did not return the said amount to them, the CBI said.
During the investigation, the CBI successfully traced databases containing details of depositors who were deceived into investing in these unregulated deposit schemes.