Bhubaneswar, July 18: A woman, who was arrested by Capital police yesterday for cheating people of more than Rs 1 lakh in the name of running self-help groups, was today sent to jail after her bail plea was rejected by a court.
The police said Subasini Das, 43, had cheated more than 150 people, mostly women, from slums and low-income groups residing in the Ganganagar area. Das, a native of Ranapur area in Nayagarh district, had been staying in the public works department’s (PWD) colony in Ganganagar.
Sources said she disappeared after taking money from women in the name of various SHGs. As she did not return, the women got suspicious and later she was found hiding in her native place. Some of these women yesterday caught Das from her village and handed her over to the Mahila police.
As the matter did not come under the jurisdiction of Mahila police station, it was sent to Capital police. One of the victims, Chemamani Behera, lodged a complaint with the police that registered a case against the woman under section 420 of the Indian Penal Code. “We produced her in court. As nobody from her side came to appeal for her bail, she was sent to judicial custody,” said a police officer.
The officer said the accused, mother of a school-going boy, was helping the women to form self-help groups to get loans from different micro-finance institutions. She later collected money from these women promising them to help in repaying their loans. More than 150 women had kept their money with Das. But recently she fled from the PWD Colony with all their money.
The officer said while she had taken money from the women, she had kept some guarantors for each of them. “After she fled, the women quarrelled among themselves and then caught her from her village,” he said.
Sources said several people had been taking advantage of such self-help groups and harassing the poor and low income group women promising them loans from micro-finance institutions which also harass these women while collecting money.
In March, some women in the Saliasahi area had detained the employees of a micro-finance company for trying to collect money from them.
