Opposition parties in Tripura on Tuesday trained their guns on the Left Front government for promoting illegal chit fund bodies after the CBI served a notice to Social Welfare Minister Bijita Nath.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) told the Social Welfare Minister in a letter on Friday that CBI officers would meet her at her official residence in Agartala on June 29 in connection with a case registered in Kolkata relating to the Rose Valley chit fund group.
The Trinamool Congress (TMC), the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) separately charged the Left Front government with promoting illegal chit fund organisations and unauthorised Non-Banking Financial Organisations (NBFCs) in Tripura.
They also demanded the minister's removal for her "involvement with the unlawful chit fund bodies".
"Owning moral responsibility Chief Minister Manik Sarkar must resign. The state government enacted Acts in 2000 to deal with the illegal chit fund bodies and NBFCs, but the enforcement of the Act was not proper," TMC leader Sudip Roy Barman told the media here on Tuesday.
Congress legislature party leader Gopal Roy demanded that the state government should return the deposited amount of 14 lakh depositors of the state.
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"Chief Minister Manik Sarkar inaugurated a Rose Valley amusement park at Amtali (near here) in 2008. The Left Front government is entirely responsible for rising of chit fund companies in Tripura," he said.
Roy alleged that Manik Sarkar and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have a secret nexus and use the CBI for their political interests.
He added that his party would organise a massive agitation in the coming days if their demands are not fulfilled.
The BJP too demanded Sarkar's resignation.
BJP Vice-President Subal Bhowmik said people deposited money in the illegal chit fund bodies and NBFCs as the ruling Left Front Ministers and their leaders promoted these unauthorised organisations.
Reacting to the opposition parties demand, Communist Party of India-Marxist's Tripura State Secretary Bijan Dhar said the Left Front government is the first state government which enacted a law in 2000 and referred 37 cases to the CBI in 2013 to deal with these unauthorised bodies.
"We also want that money of the cheated people must be returned to them. We are not afraid of the CBI's notice to a minister as we are all clean on the issue," Dhar told the media late on Monday evening.
The CBI notice, a copy of which is with IANS, told the Social Welfare Minister: "It appears that you are acquainted with the circumstances of the case under the Prize Chits and Money Circulation Schemes (Banking) Act, 1978 against the Chairman, Rose Valley Hotel and Entertainment Limited and others."
Earlier, there were reports in a section of the media that Nath, who also holds the Science and Technology and Environment portfolios, was indirectly involved with the Rose Valley chit fund organisation. However, she has denied the allegations so far.
The Tripura government since last year began confiscating all movable and immovable properties of the Rose Valley chit fund organisation in the state.
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 High Court had in 2015 asked the state government to set up a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe illegal Non Banking Financial Companies (NBFCs) and chit fund organisations.
The Tripura government last week appointed Deputy Inspector General of Police Uttam Majumder as head of the SIT replacing Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) K.V. Sreejesh.
Opposition parties lashed out at the state government for changing the SIT chief.
In May 2013, the Tripura government had referred 37 cases relating to chit fund companies and NBFCs to the CBI. The central probe agency, however, took up only five cases.
--IANS
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