Four held for Rs 39-cr scam

The Mahadevapura police have arrested four people, including a couple, for allegedly cheating investors in their chit fund scheme of about Rs 39 crore.

The arrested have been identified as Krishnamurthy, 48 and his wife Shantamma, 45 both residents of Kadugodi. The couple have been operating a chitfund, Maruthi Chit Funds, for the last 15 years. Police have also arrested Suresh, 40, and Venkatesh, 42, who served as directors of the company. According to police, Krishnamurthy had been successfully running the chit fund for many years and was prompt in paying his investors back. However, as the chit fund went bankrupt recently, Krishnamurthy had closed the company and fled the City in the last week of August. His family had also gone missing since that time.

News of the bankruptcy had surprised many of the investors. One of them, Charan Rao, a resident of RT Nagar,  said that he had been investing money in the company for many years and that it had been reliable. On discovering that the company had gone bankrupt in August, however, Rao went to the office to collect his money only to see it closed down. “Since then, Krishnamurthy and all other directors in the company remained incommunicando,” he said. Rao lodged a complaint with Mahadevapura police on September 1, leading to the arrest.