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Chit fund firm staff, investors block rail track in Ludhiana, 25 trains hit
Rail traffic disrupted for four hours near city; passengers sweat it out amid hot and humid conditions for hours with no answers.
Nearly 500 protesters comprising investors and employees of a chit fund company blocked the railway track in Ludhiana, bringing trains to a halt for nearly four hours on Thursday evening.
More than 25 trains, including the Amritsar-New Delhi Shatabdi Express and the Ludhiana-New Delhi Shatabdi Express were affected, putting to inconvenience hundreds of passengers.
They were protesting under the banner of Insaaf Di Awaaz having investors and employees of Pearls Group, a Punjab-based chit fund company which is in the dock for duping investors of ₹59,000 crore from across the region. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is probing the case.
At 4pm, the protestors gathered at Dana Mandi from where they marched towards the railway line near Dukhniwaran Gurdwara on the outskirts of the city and stopped the Katra-Hapa Sarvodaya Express.
Later, the protest intensified with more people from Jammu and Haryana thronging the tracks, sending police and Railway Police Force (RPF) into a tizzy.
They claimed that a piece of land at Sahnewal measuring 750 acres was illegally possessed by local politicians belonging to the Congress and the BJP in connivance with the directors of the Pearls Group. They said an independent probe be conducted by the police to probe this land.
They refused to lift the protest until the government conducts a probe into the land.
Insaaf Di Awaaz president Mahinder Pal Singh said, “We have been forced to take this step as no one was listening to us. Income from all Pearls Group properties should be forwarded to the commission through the state government so that the investors can get their money back. We also demand a high-level inquiry into the properties of all relatives and friends of the Pearls Group MD,” he said.
He said the state should frame stricter laws against chit fund companies.
After two hours, the Sarvodaya Express was shifted back to the station. The protest was lifted at 7.45pm after the police registered an FIR against the Pearls Group.
Probe into land ordered
Senior police officials reached the spot and started an investigation into the piece of land at Sahnewal. Police commissioner RN Dhoke said, “We have initiated an inquiry under Section 145 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). We will verify from the district revenue authorities as to who are the owners of the land.”
The case
The CBI had registered a case in February 2014, against Pearls Group MD Nirmal Singh Bhangoo and his associates. Pearls Agrotech Corporation Limited (PACL) and Pearls Golden Forest Limited (PGFL) used to run a ponzi scheme.
The CBI claimed that PACL and PGF were running the schemes illegally and were allegedly engaged in fraudulent activities in their day-to-day operations.
Probe also revealed that the accused fraudulently diverted funds collected from a Jaipur-based private company to invest in Australia.
