The victims of the financial scam related to the BSNL Engineers’ Cooperative Society (No. T-950) have demanded that close relatives and ‘benamis’ of the main accused in the case be arraigned as accused.
The BSNL Engineers’ Cooperative Society Save Forum, which represents the victims, has given a representation to the Additional Director General of Police (Crime Branch) seeking the inclusion of close relatives of the 21 accused in the list of accused.
The forum is planning to take up the matter with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.
The victims allege that the Crime Branch has not listed them as accused despite these individuals reportedly buying up property with money embezzled from the society.
There is evidence that the relatives amassed wealth disproportionate to their known sources of income, the forum said in a representation to the ADGP (Crime Branch). The ‘benamis,’ according to it, include the two daughters of the first accused and former society president A. R. Gopinathan, and kin of other key accused including former clerk Rajeev A. R., the third accused.
The scam pertains to the embezzlement of depositors’ money to the tune of ₹260 crore. Several hundreds of depositors, majority of them in the 65-85 age group, who had invested in deposit schemes offered by the society, were cheated of their life savings. The inquiry report on the scam had detected “serious financial misappropriation” through bogus Fixed Deposit receipts, maintaining parallel registers and fixed deposit certificates without making entries in the fixed deposit register and so.
The BSNL Engineers’ Cooperative Society Save Forum has also demanded the Crime Branch to arrest Mr. Gopinathan and Mr. Rajeev, who are now out on conditional bail, in the remaining cases related to the scam. The forum, in a separate petition, urged the ADGP (Crime Branch) to direct the SP/DySP, Economic Offences Wing, to arrest them without delay.
