Dadeldhura. According to the call of District Police Office Dadeldhura, more than two thousand savers of Dadeldhura, who were cheated by Shivshikhar Multi-Purpose Cooperative Society Limited, have filed a complaint with Saparamana Police.
Shivsikhar Multi-Purpose Co-operative Society, which collected 42 crores of deposits from Dadeldhura district alone on the condition of paying double the amount after five years to the savers, has closed its office and the employees are absconding as it could not return the savings.
According to the police officers involved in the investigation, it was found that the cooperative, which has its head office in Bhaktapur district, has collected deposits from 6,000 savers by establishing a branch office in Dadeldhura district.
Shivshikhar Cooperative, which has established branch offices in various places across the country, has established branches in Dadeldhura along with Doti, Kailali and Kanchanpur in Far West Province.
District Police Office Dadeldhura has called on the general public who have savings in Shivshir Cooperative to file a complaint through a public notice. As of Friday, 1,365 complaints have been registered from more than 2,000 savers, said DSP Manohar Prasad Bhatta, the police chief of Dadeldhura District Police Office.
The police said that since group complaints were requested from savers who are members of the same family, complaints were registered less than the number of savers who filed complaints. Since the co-operative could not return the money, the office was closed and the director and staff were absconding, so the general public was requested to lodge a complaint.
Based on the complaint of the victim, there is evidence that seven and a half million rupees have been deposited in the cooperative. The police officials involved in the investigation say that the number of victims will increase as the process of taking complaints from the victims will continue till next week.
DSP Bhatt said that since the savers and customers of the cooperative are located outside Dadeldhura district in Doti, Kailali and even in India, the complaints may take up to two weeks. “We have started a police investigation in relation to Shivsikhar Cooperative,” he said.
Preliminary investigation by the police has shown that Shivshikhar Cooperative Society has collected deposits of 14 billion rupees across the country. The co-operative was closed after the customer could not repay the loan and interest.
The common people here were regularly saving in the cooperative organization on the condition that if they save in the cooperative, they will be paid twice the amount in five years. Some have said that they have saved money even by taking out loans.
Since the depositors have filed a complaint with the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) of Nepal Police as well from the offices in other districts, there is a similar problem in Dadeldhura.
The cooperative has launched a mart in Dadeldhura in the name of a private company by investing two and a half million rupees. The cooperative was doing business and collecting deposits under the names of various firms including Shivashikhar Organization, Shivashikhar Pvt Ltd, Shivashikhar Agro. It has been mentioned that the deposits collected from Dadeldhura were given loans to Shivshikhar Organization and Shivshikhar Pvt Ltd.
But the fact that the cooperative provided loans has not been found. Customers of local and cooperatives have become angry because they have given loans to their own organizations and private companies. Since the complaint has been registered against the cooperative, the savers here have demanded that the director and the employees be immediately informed and return the savings amount.