Bhubaneswar: In a significant move for justice for people cheated by illegal financial schemes / chit fund scams, the Odisha government has returned ₹128 crore to 3,27,642 real depositors. Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi shared this news in the State Assembly, saying district collectors distributed the money to people who lost their savings to various fraudulent chit fund companies.

The government managed to pull this off by aggressively seizing and auctioning off properties from well-known scam companies. Some of the main players in this mess, like Rose Valley Group, Golden Land Group, and Hi-Tech Estate Promoter Pvt. Ltd., had both their physical assets and bank accounts taken. That’s how the state got the funds together to pay back those affected.

To make sure the people who suffered the most got help first, the government set up a special ₹300 crore corpus fund. This fund is for small depositors—people who put in smaller amounts but felt the biggest blow. Officials used seven reports from a specialized inquiry commission, as well as local investigations, to check and confirm who actually deserved compensation.

The Chief Minister told the Assembly this isn’t done yet. The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) is still looking into a bunch of other shady financial firms. So far, the state’s looked at 90 proposals to seize property, and they’ve issued temporary attachment orders against 68 illegal firms. Designated courts have already made 42 of those orders permanent, so the auctions and compensations will keep going until every genuine depositor gets their money back.