Congress councillor gives CBI documents on Saradha scam

NEW DELHI: CBI has begun its probe in the over Rs 10,000-crore Saradha chit fund case as its seven-member Special Investigating Team (SIT) started collecting documents pertaining to the cases from four states and other agencies.

CBI Director Ranjit Sinha will soon be holding a meeting with the officers on the case which was transferred by the Supreme Court last week.

Over the next two weeks, CBI will collect documents from Odhisa, West Bengal, Bihar and Northeastern states after which an action plan for probe would be decided upon, the agency said.

The SIT, to be headed by Joint Director Rajeev Singh, will also probe the role of market regulators like Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and RBI.

CBI Special Director Anil Kumar Sinha has been asked to monitor the progress in the probe into the cases and exercise administrative control under the overall supervision of the CBI Director.

The team was formed in the wake of the Supreme Court order on Friday on a PIL on Friday asking CBI to probe the matter and directing the state police to cooperate with the central agency in the investigation.

CBI will also look into the role of SEBI, authorities under the Companies Act and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as directed by the apex court, agency sources said.

"Investigation conducted so far puts a question mark on the role of regulatory authorities like SEBI, Registrar of Companies and officials of the RBI within whose respective jurisdictions and areas of operation the scam not only took birth but flourished unhindered," a bench headed by Justice T S Thakur said in its order.

Saradha Group's chief Sudipta Sen was arrested by West Bengal Police in Kashmir last year. Kunal Kumar Ghosh, a Trinamool Congress MP, was also arrested on November 23 last year in connection with the scam. Ghosh was the media CEO of Saradha Group of Companies.