GUWAHATI, Sept 2 � The Consumers� Legal Protection Forum (CLPF) has demanded that the CBI bring the Assam Police�s Bureau of Investigation of Economic Offences (BIEO) within its ambit of investigation.
The Forum alleged that the BIEO had been patronising the dubious non-banking financial companies that hoodwinked the common people in the State.
The Forum, while demanding that the CBI interrogate those at the helm of affairs in the BIEO, said their role in the BIEO had been highly suspicious as the organisation did not take any action even after the Forum submitted proof of looting by the fake non-banking financial companies.
CLPF chief coordinator Ajay Hazarika and administrator Subhash Mohan Sarma also accused the BIEO officials of being in nexus with the non-banking financial companies. �Instead of investigating the activities of various non-banking financial companies collecting funds in Assam, the BIEO was protecting them all along. The Assam Government had entrusted the BIEO with investigating the activities of fraud financial companies, but after the BIEO came into the scene the chit fund business began to thrive,� alleged the CLPF functionaries.
The Forum said fifty fake financial companies looted around Rs 2,500 crore from Assam.
�We did disclose this information on September 23, 2010. We kept the RBI, the BIEO and the State government informed of it. However, the BIEO took no action against the fake financial companies collecting chit funds. For the current situation emerging due to chit funds, the BIEO, the state administration and the RBI are responsible. We did lodge many complaints but they fell on deaf ears,� regretted the Forum.
The Forum pointed out that although in 2012 Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi asked the BIEO to conduct an inquiry into the activities of non-banking financial companies doing business in Assam without approval from the RBI and submit its report within 15 days, this direction was defied.
�The government itself has admitted that many non-banking financial companies were doing business in the State without the mandatory approval from the RBI. Now we demand immediate stop to such illegal transactions and the CBI should conduct a neutral investigation,� said the Forum.
