Life imprisonment to 8 in Pincon chit fund case

Kolkata: Eight persons, including the owner of Pincon chit fund Manoranjan Roy and his wife Mousumi, were held guilty by the court on Saturday and were awarded life imprisonment along with a fine of Rs five lakh each.

The court has also directed the investigating agency to sell out the properties of the Pincon Group which are already seized and return the money to the investors.

The first complaint was lodged against Pincon Group for collecting money from the market illegally in 2017 at Khejuri police station. Later, the state Economic Offence Wing took up the investigation and arrested several portfolio holders of the Pincon Group, including Manoranjan and Mousumi. Though Mousumi was granted bail, Manoranjan was in judicial custody.

Bibhas Chatterjee, the cyber expert and the Special Public prosecutor of the case, had placed several electronic evidence including the hard discs used by the Pincon Group's office. An employee of the company who used to maintain the accounts was made the witness and he recovered several data from the hard discs and revealed that the company had collected Rs 864 crore from the market.

During the trial phase, two of the 20 accused persons died. On Saturday, the magistrate of Tamluk Court acquitted 10 accused persons and held eight others guilty for cheating, criminal breach of trust and criminal conspiracy. However, the court had earlier ordered Manoranjan to be present on Saturday as his lawyer submitted an appeal that due to his health condition he could not come to the court. On Saturday, Manoranjan was found absent and the court instructed a video conference while he pronounced the accused persons guilty along with the quantum of punishment. Mousumi was held as an absconder as she was not present at the court. Chatterjee was instructed by the court to send the order and quantum of punishment to her WhatsApp number.

The present DG Civil Defence Bibhuti Bhusan Dash, the then Director of Economic Offences when the investigation was carried out, said the judgment comes as a major success as it seems to be the first chit fund case in which life imprisonment has been pronounced in the country. This validates the quality of the investigation and painstaking efforts that went into it. It is hoped that the depositors will start getting back their money shortly.