Odisha chit fund scam: CBI grills DSP Pramod Panda again

Reported by Santosh Jagdev
Bhubaneswar, Dec 18:

DSP Pramod Panda, currently posted in the district intelligence bureau (DIB), Nayagarh, was interrogated by the CBI  in connection with the Odisha chit fund scam this evening. This is the second time he has been questioned in the last two days.

The former Crime Branch DSP, who had been quizzed yesterday, was questioned for nearly an hour today.

Like yesterday, he came on a Pulsar bike and steered clear of the media persions eagerly waiting to ask him about the nature of the interrogation.

Panda is under the scanner for his alleged involvement with some of the leading lights of the chit fund, besides facing a charge of criminal intimidation slapped on him by Alok Jena, whose petition in the Supreme Court led to the CBI probe into the mega scam.

Also under the scanner is a computer institute, named Zee Institute of Creative Arts (ZICA), run by his wife Gitanjali Panda. The institute offering courses in animation and computer graphics allegedly received money from some chit fund operators.

The CBI issued a summons to Panda on Tuesday, a day after the Odisha High Court rejected his anticipatory bail petition.

Earlier, the CBI had raided his residence in Bhadrak and seized some incriminating documents, which included the charge sheet filed against Jagabandhu Panda, a relative of his, and some papers of the AT Group.

Panda had been suspended after Alok Jena’s charge, but has been recently reinstated and posted as DSP, DIB, Nayagarh.