The toll in the chit fund bust rose to five in West Bengal Thursday with an agent of a chit fund company allegedly committing suicide by consuming poison at her home in Murshidabad district's Salar.
Family members of 28-year-old Pratima Das said she took the extreme step unable to return the money she had collected for the scheme from the depositors.
Das was crestfallen after she returned from a branch office of a chit fund company at Katwa in Burdwan district on finding it was locked.
Over the past few days, she was being constantly threatened by depositors who wanted their money back.
Four agents and distributors of chit fund companies have taken their own lives since the chit fund aided Saradha Group went bust, affecting tens of thousands of investors - mainly from the small towns and villages - who had parked their hard earned money with the company.