BHUBANESWAR: The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) on Sunday morning arrested managing director of Creative Asset Developers Pvt Ltd Santosh Jena for duping hundreds of investors to the tune of several crores of rupees.
Jena’s real estate firm had collected more than `1.5 crore from people to provide plots as well as flats in various projects executed by the company. The investors were promised property in Mangalpur under Pipili, Argul under Jatni and Kateni under Bhubaneswar tehsils.
Creative Asset had also floated a lottery scheme and collected deposits in instalments on weekly basis from the depositors. Since it did not have the required land, it could not provide the plots to its customers. Besides, Jena and his associates had spent much of the deposits and failed to refund the depositors.
When he faced pressure from the investors, Jena shut down his Bhubaneswar office and absconded. The EOW, acting on a tip-off, rounded him off from a rented house at Mallick Complex in Jagamara here during wee hours of the day. Later during a search, incriminating documents were seized from his flat.
Special DG (Crime) Bijay Sharma said Jena is believed to have invested in chit fund firm Flourish India for buying land. However, since Flourish India had cheated investors, Jena could not get the land and in turn failed to pay his depositors. In fact, EOW had also attached assets belonging to Flourish India. With the investors on his trail, two years back, Jena had fled to Dubai on a forged passport, Sharma said.