Most of the duped investors in the multi-crore emu contract farming scam in the district last year were literates and very knowledgeable and had been lured by 'greed', according to a survey by Reserve Bank of India.
The investors had been lured by attractive schemes offered by the emu farms, RBI Chief General Manager V Vasanthan said here today.
The survey covering 800 investors in 22 villages from Erode, where a maximum number of investors had been cheated in the emu racket, was held from July 19 to July 22 he told a meeting of self-help groups and farmers to create awareness about problems in investing in unregistered private firms.
Hundreds of people had been cheated crores of rupees after they made investments in contract farming of the Australian bird on promise of very high returns like any ponzi scheme.
The emu scam came to fore in August last year after Susi Emu Farm in Perundurai near here failed to make assured monthly payments, triggering collapse of several such firms, leaving in lurch both the investors and the birds.
The Economic Offences Wing of police have arrested proprietors of several firms and the cases are being heard by a special court.
Vasanthan said before investing, people should find out whether the finance firms had been registered and authorised to receive money.
People from Erode, Tirupur and Coimbatore had invested not only EMU farms but in country fowl farms and Agar tree development schemes.
He urged the people to invest money only in registered firms as there was no law to control the unregistered firms.
The official said the RBI would soon release ten rupee plastic currency notes.
On fake currency circulation, he said most of the counterfeit notes came into the country through Nepal, Pakistan and Bangladesh, adding serious steps had been taken to curb them.
