Bhubaneswar: Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Sunday trained his guns at Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik alleging that the ruling BJD is deliberately delaying the process to refund the hard earned money of innocent people duped in the chit fund scam.
Expressing concerns over the inordinate delay in refund of money, Pradhan said that the State government has been promising people to refund money since 2013; and ahead of the 2014 polls, CM Naveen even created a corpus fund of Rs 300 crore giving hope to the duped investors that their money would be returned, but it ‘was only to hoodwink people’.
On extension of the tenure of Justice MM Das Commission probing the multi-crore scam by six months, the Union Minister said that attempts are being made to deliberately delay the refund process and once ‘justice delayed is justice denied'.
“The hard earned money of Odia people has been looted under the patronage of Ministers, MP, MLAs and leaders of the ruling BJD. CM Naveen has been lying to the duped investors repeatedly. Why are the ruling party members so reactive if the CM is termed a liar? Allegations of CM duping honest Odia’s have been proven,” Pradhan tweeted.
“What is the link between CM Naveen and Saroj Sahoo? Why is the CM silent despite several questions being pointed at him in the chit fund scam. People of Odisha are seeking answers from ‘PC Babu’ over the inordinate delay in refund of their hard earned money,” he further said.
The story will be further updated after getting comments of the BJD leaders on the Union Minister’s allegations.