Couple nabbed for duping investors of Rs 20 cr

Bhubaneswar: The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Odisha Police arrested a Chartered Accountant and his wife from Noida in Uttar Pradesh in connection with Rs 20 crore fraud case. The accused couple have been identified as Chandra Sekhar Sahoo and Jharana Sahoo of Anandapur in Keonjhar district. The duo was arrested on December 12 after a case was registered on December 8 on the basis of a complaint lodged by Jayant Mishra, an employee with Mahanadi Coalfields Limited, Balanda, Talcher.

During the course of the investigation, police found that Chandra Sekhar Sahoo, who earlier worked as a Chartered Accountant with MCL, Talcher, later resigned from the job and opened a company, M/s Evoreach Ventures Pvt. Ltd., in 2021. Chandra Sekhar was the Managing Director, while his wife Jharana was one of the Directors of the company. “Subsequently, he converted the company from Private Limited to Public Limited and floated different unregulated deposit schemes illegally promising high returns to the investors. He was mainly inducing the investors to double the invested amount in 30 months by paying 30 equal returns every month,” informed EOW sources.

The complainant Jayant Mishra also claimed that, being induced by the accused duo, he and his wife had invested more than Rs 1.05 crore in various schemes of M/s Evoreach Ventures Pvt. Ltd. between February 2022 and February 2024. Chandra Sekhar also collected different amounts from various persons, not only for investment in his company but also for share trading with Octa FX and many other trading companies.

He mentioned to investors that the collected amounts were being reinvested in real estate, retail mart, pearl culture, fish farming and hotel business, among others. However, the investors’ money was being deposited both in the account of M/s Evoreach Ventures Pvt. Ltd. as well as in the personal accounts of the Directors.

After paying the promised returns initially for a few months to some investors, the accused Directors closed the company offices at Handidhua in Talcher and Patia in Bhubaneswar, and subsequently absconded. “Believing in the accused Directors, a large number of investors, not only from Odisha but also from Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, etc., invested huge amounts through the schemes floated by the company,” EOW sources said.