Kendrapara, Dec. 9: Residents of remote villages do not seem to have learnt any lessons and continue to be cheated by investing in dubious money circulation companies.

Hundreds of investors, who had been taken for a ride by such a company for the past one year, today lodged an FIR at Mahakalpada police station.

A dubious firm perpetrated the fraud even after the money deposit collection scam had come under crime branch and CBI scanner.

A self-styled non-banking financial firm - Agragami Agro-Finance Company - has run away with an estimated Rs 3 crore from the villagers of Mahakalpada block.

The company had been operating in the area since past one year. The villagers did not cross-check credential of the company even though fraud of this nature had widely come to light across the state.

Inspector of Mahakalpada police station Padarbind Mohapatra said that lured by hefty return of the investment, deposits had been made in the company through its agents.

A case of fraud under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code has been registered against the firm. 'We have referred the matter to economic offence wing of the state crime branch,' he said.

The poor depositors were in for a rude jolt after they had found the offices of the finance firm closed. The company officials remained incommunicado as their mobile phones were switched off. After realising that they have been taken in for a ride, the duped investors knocked at the doors of local police.

The majority of duped depositors were lured into investment in the said money deposit collection company as they were assured of abnormally high return. They were told of doubling up of sum in a two-year span. The investors mostly included small and marginal farmers, cattle farmers, daily labourers and petty traders.

Both the civil and police administration have alerted the people not to fall into the trap of bogus finance companies. Still people are recklessly investing in the sham companies and losing out their hard-earned money. The administration has also to issue advisories to the panchayati raj institutions for spreading awareness on risk involved in the dubious financial companies, said Kendrapara collector Pramod Kumar Das.

The panchayati raj institutions have been called upon to convince the people to abstain from investing in the dubious money deposit collection companies. Their efforts would be to encourage the people to invest the money in government-sponsored small investment schemes and do savings in nationalised banks and post offices, said an official.

'I had invested Rs 5,000 in 2013. A glib-talking company executive had assured me of doubling up of the sum in 24 months. Now, the firm has disappeared, leaving poor people like us in dire straits,' said an investor from Ramnanagar village, Ramen Mandal.