Patna/Bhagalpur, Sept. 4: Chief minister Nitish Kumar today said people who do not have faith in the CBI investigation into the Srijan scam involving illegal transfer of welfare funds from bank accounts of the state government should approach the judiciary to request court monitoring.

He added that government accounts in all blocks are being probed to find out how much money are in them.

'People should trust the CBI probe. Those who do not trust should approach the high court and the Supreme Court with documents and request for court monitoring. We are checking how much money is there in which government account in each and every block so that there is no scope for any wrong-doing,' Nitish said.

The chief minister was talking to media persons on the sidelines of his Lok Samvad (public interaction) programme at his official 1 Aney Marg residence in Patna.

Iterating that he first got information about the scam on August 8 from his officials and brought it into the public domain the very next day, Nitish said initially the scam was known to be of around Rs 250 crore. Hence, he had dispatched officials of the Economic Offences Unit (EOU) of the Bihar police and the finance department to investigate the matter.

'I reviewed the matter and then recommended a CBI probe, which was accepted. We are providing all information and documents to the CBI. Many new dimensions will come to light. Any person or official whose involvement is suspected will be thoroughly probed,' the chief minister added.

Pointing out that it was he who brought the Srijan scam into the public domain, Nitish said: 'Anybody involved in it, may he be x,y,z, will not be spared. I request you all to share any fact or information that you may chance upon with the CBI.'

The chief minister also asserted that systemic arrangements should be put in place to avoid any such scam in the future and revealed that work for it had already started.

Meanwhile, investigations in Bhagalpur have revealed that amounts as large as Rs 50 crore were transferred from Srijan's accounts to other accounts in fake names in a single day through RTGS (Real Time Gross Settlement).

'Suppose the scamsters needed some money, they first sent the amount from Srijan's account to some bank account registered under fake identities through RTGS and withdrew it subsequently. The person who did so managed to hide his identity during such huge transactions,' a senior SIT (special investigation team) member pointed out.

The investigating agencies earlier managed to seize some important documents and registers of Srijan Mahila bank and subsequently handed them to the CBI.

According to sources, from one such document, it has come to light that Rs 24.54 crore was transferred to two account holders at Srijan Mahila Bank - Rampayari Devi and Ramdulari Devi - on November 18, 2014, through RTGS from Srijan's account held at Bank of Baroda in Bhagalpur. The RTGS identities are available with the investigation agencies.

The CBI, which started searching for the two women in Sabour locality of Bhagalpur, were frustrated after the addresses turned out to be fake. The other leads about the two women also turned out to be false.

An ordinary homemaker, Dulari (her husband is a daily wage earner), who opened her account with other self-help group members with Srijan Mahila Bank in 2014, had said earlier that bank officials used to keep their passbooks for several months on various pretexts, and also made them deposit their 'voter identity cards' along with four passport-size photographs.

CBI sleuths said that such documents could have been used to open fake bank accounts. Interestingly, the ace investigation agency has another puzzle to solve - why Rs 50 crore were transferred on one particular day into 10 accounts at the branch of Bank of Baroda.

All the 10 account-holders - Md Maksud, SK Tajmul, SK Jumman, SK Jumman (II), S K Tajmul, SK Rajjak, SK Rajjak (II), Aladdin Khan, Shamir Khan and Mosim Khan - on November 19, 2014, received different amounts in their accounts through RTGS from the account of Srijan with the bank.

Similarly, on August 5, 2014, nearly Rs 1.25 crore was transferred in the same way to six other persons - SK Suleman, SK Islam, SK Ayyub, SK Samid, SK Sobil and SK Khalil.

RJD MP from Bhagalpur Bulo Mandal has urged the CBI to investigate such rackets to establish the facts soon. A day-long dharna was organized today in front of the office of the Bhagalpur district magistrate in protest against the Srijan scam and also for speedy investigations to punish the real culprits.