More than 200 men and women from the Kajigram panchayat in Malda district staged a protest on Wednesday, alleging that nearly ₹2 crore, which they had deposited in their savings bank accounts, had been siphoned off by the manager of the customer service point (CSP) of the Indian Bank and his spouse.
The aggrieved account holders first demonstrated outside the CSP at Nityanandapur in Kajigram. Later, they reached the main branch of the Indian Bank in Malda town, demanding the immediate return of their money and the arrest of CSP operator Satyajit Lala and his wife, Nipa.
According to the protesters, the alleged fraud had been continuing for a long time without their knowledge.
Many claimed that Lala misused their biometric authentication during transactions and withdrew amounts far exceeding what the customers intended to take out from their accounts.
“Whenever we went to withdraw money, the CSP manager would take our biometric authentication. Later, we knew that he used to withdraw two or three times the requested amount. If someone wanted to withdraw ₹10,000, he would withdraw ₹30,000 or more and keep the remaining amount with himself,” alleged Suman Ghosh, an account holder.
Other depositors alleged that they were also cheated while updating their passbooks.
“He even asked for biometric verification in the name of updating passbooks and then withdrew money from our accounts. Most of us are not educated enough to understand such fraudulent activities,” said Iti Mandal, another depositor.
The protesters said their suspicion grew over the past month when Lala and his wife allegedly began refusing withdrawals, citing technical issues such as server or link failures.
The account holders later contacted the bank’s main branch and were shocked to discover that many of their accounts had insufficient balances.
“We are poor people. Many of us deposited our hard-earned savings, government assistance, and even fixed deposits through the CSP. Some lost ₹2 lakh, some ₹5 lakh, and others even more. We are all ruined,” said Sumita Paswan.
The depositors demonstrated for nearly three hours in front of the bank’s main branch in Malda.
Praveen Kumar, a senior official of the bank, said the customers had been asked to submit individual written complaints, detailing the amounts deposited and withdrawn through the CSP. “We will look into the matter after receiving the complaints,” he said.
The agitators said they would file police complaints against the couple.
Lala and his wife, they said, have been missing for the past two days, and both the CSP outlet and their residence were found locked.
The couple could not be contacted as calls could not be completed on their cellphones.