Pehowa residents duped by ‘agents’ of coop society

Kurukshetra, July 31

A case of cheating has come to light at Pehowa, where several residents have been duped over Rs 20 lakh allegedly by a cooperative society on the pretext of giving higher returns on the maturity of fixed deposit (FD) and recurring deposit (RD) schemes.

A case has been registered against Arun, his father Ved Prakash, Malook Singh, his sons Gurpreet Singh and Harpreet Singh of Punjab, and Pradeep Kumar under Sections 406 and 420, IPC.

In a complaint, Baljinder Kaur, a resident of Pehowa, stated that Arun and his father ran a Common Service Centre at Pehowa. In 2017, Arun told her that he and his father were agents of Sarvotam Vikas Multi-State Housing Cooperative Society Limited and their company gave double the amount of FD and RD with interest on maturity in six years.

“They assured me that several people had deposited their money with them and they would be responsible in case of any loss. I deposited Rs 4.5 lakh in the form of three FDs in 2017 and 2018 for six years. In January this year, at the time of maturity of the FDs, when I asked them for the amount, they assured me that I would soon get the payment. A few days later, when I again went to their shop, I found several people standing there and enquiring about their respective FDs and RDs,” she stated.

She further alleged that all depositors were seeking their payments on the maturity of the term, but the agents were not giving any satisfactory reply and started threatening them with dire consequences if they again demanded their money.