Chit fund scam: CBI raids senior Odisha scribe’s house

Reported by Santosh Jagdev
Bhubaneswar, Nov 20:

It was senior journalist Lalit Pattjoshi’s turn to face a CBI raid in connection with the mega chit fund scam in Odisha on Thursday evening.

The raid on the residence of Pattjoshi at 3R-16/1 in Unit IV here continued till about 9 pm when the five-member CBI team emerged with a stack of documents seized during the raid. The seized documents included his bank account books and those of his wife.

Pattjoshi was questioned about the source of funds for the house in IRC Village here (N3/193) he had purchased. After Pattjoshi claimed that the house was purchased by his wife, he was quesioned by the sources of her income and seized her bank account books.

Though there is no official word yet on what led to the raid on Pattajoshi, sources in the central investiagting aganecy said the Managing Editor of Pragativadi is being raided for his alleged links with the Seashore group of companies.

Coming as it does two days after the arrest of land broker and influence peddler Subhankar Nayak, the raid on Pattjoshi’s residence is believed to be part of the ongoing investigation against the Seashore group, the biggest of the chit fund companies in the state.

There have been allegations that Pattjoshi had facilitated Nayak’s enrty into the power circle in the state.