Hundreds of people, who were allegedly cheated of their investments in Pearls Agrotech Corporation Limited (PACL), thronged its office situated on Goods Shed Street here on Tuesday, demanding refund.
Investors alleged that agents of the company had cheated them of thousands of rupees by assuring a return of double the investment in six years. Thilagar Thidal police arrived at the spot and held talks with the employees and investors.
According to the police, the company, which opened its office in Madurai in 1993, had collected around Rs.5 crore from several people in the southern districts in the past five years. It allegedly stopped returning the amount on maturity, as promised at the time of investment, in 2014. The company had collected the money through deposits from public for a real estate scheme.
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R. Narayanan of Palanganatham said, “I had invested Rs.22,000 with the hope that I would get an assured amount of Rs.50,000 in six years for my daughter’s wedding. Several people have invested money with the company on my assurance.”
“Money was collected as investment from depositors and later used to buy land across the country,” said investors.
It may be noted that PACL is being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on the charge of defrauding crores of investors in India of an estimated Rs.50,000 crore. The CBI had conducted a series of raids in February on the office premises of PACL in Delhi, Chandigarh, Punjab and Haryana.
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The raids led to recovery of huge records and data relating to deposits from public and diversion of funds, besides other documents which were now in the custody of the CBI, said an employee of the firm.
“Moreover, the CBI had frozen the accounts of the company which is causing a delay in disbursing the promised amount to investors,” he added.