Manhunt for "Kuber" conmen

The EOW officers are baffled at the investment schemes galore. It all began with Vaibhav Laxmi scheme launched by a BEST employee, Ashok Sheregar. The scheme was to deposit Rs 2,000 with him, introduce two more members and in two months take home double the investment.

Taking a cue from Sheregar, Shrikant Dhole and Sunil Shette launched another improved scheme, Dhanvarsha. Unlike Sheregar’s scheme, with a restriction of minimum Rs 2,000 as the investment, the Dhole-Shette duo began accepting any amount and doubled the money in only 30 days.

Close on the heels of Dhanvarsha scheme was launched, the Kuber scheme, a brainchild of Prakash Chavan and Ashok Prajapati bettering Dhanvarsha. They also accepted any amount and multiplied the original money by two and a half times in only 45 days.

The original conman, Sheregar was beaten. He had duped over 55,000 investors by July ’97 and made a fortune of over Rs 100 crore, found himself in the debt of Rs 18 crore. However, Sheregar soon consolidated his position and launched another scheme of Golden Chain. This scheme too had a minimum limit of Rs 5,000 and doubled the money in one month.

The EOW investigators booked the offence under the Prize, chits, money circulation scheme banning act 1978. The police could not arrest the conmen as none of the gullible investors came forward to lodge a complaint with the police.

It was then that a police officer himself filed a complaint and registered a case against Sheregar, who was arrested in July and got bail in August. According to some unconfirmed reports, one Sunil Patil, a sub-agent of Sheregar living at Ghatkopar committed suicide due to harassment from his investors and his inability to pay back. However, EOW officers say that Patil was not on the list of sub-agents of Sheregar.