Tripura re-appoints K.V. Sreejesh as SIT chief to probe chit fund groups

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After a hue and cry by political parties, the Tripura government has re-appointed senior IPS officer K.V. Sreejesh as head of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe unlawful Non-Banking Financial Organisations (NBFCs) and chit-fund organisations, an official said here on Saturday.

"Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) K.V. Sreejesh has been re-appointed as the head of the SIT to inquire into the illegal activities of the NBFCs and chit-fund organisations in Tripura," a police official said.

Director General of Police A.K. Shukla had last week appointed Deputy Inspector General of Police Uttam Majumder to head the SIT replacing Sreejesh.

After the change of the SIT head, political parties accused the Left Front government of softening its approach towards the inquiry into the illegitimate activities of the NBFCs and chit-fund organisations in the north-eastern states.

The Tripura High Court had in 2015 following a writ petition of a woman asked the state government to set up a SIT to probe unlawful NBFCs and chit-fund organisations.

The official said the SIT was probing around 80 cases, involving 48 NBFCs and chit-fund organisations, and had arrested around 115 persons.

Earlier on Thursday, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials interrogated Tripura Social Welfare Minister Bijita Nath in connection with a Kolkata-based case of the Rose Valley chit-fund scam.

Subsequently, the CBI officials, who arrived here on Wednesday from Kolkata, met various political leaders and persons to know the activities of the Rose Valley chit-fund organisation.

The CBI is probing the Chairman, Rose Valley Hotel and Entertainment Limited besides others under the Prize Chits and Money Circulation Schemes (Banking) Act, 1978.

The chit-fund organisation is now under the scanner of the Enforcement Directorate and the CBI, and its sole proprietor and Chairman Gautam Kundu was arrested in Kolkata in 2015.

The Tripura government, which enacted a law in 2000 to deal with the illegal NBFCs and chit-fund organisations since 2016, began confiscating all movable and immovable properties of the Rose Valley chit-fund organisation in the state.

In May 2013, the Tripura government had referred 37 cases related to chit-fund companies and NBFCs to the CBI. The central probe agency, however, took up only five cases.

--IANS

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