By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, September 19, 2019: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday arrested controversial former Orissa Cricket Association honorary secretary, Ashirbad Behera, in connection with his alleged involvement in the state’s multi-crore-rupees chit fund scam.

The CBI also arrested hotelier Kamalakanta Das, a hotel owner in the city along with Behera in the same case.

Behera, 74, and Das were sent to jail after a special CBI court in Bhubaneswar rejected their bail petitions. The court remanded them to judicial custody till October 1.

The CBI chargesheet alleged that Behera received Rs 1 crore from the Artha Tatwa Group which he showed as sponsorship money of the Odisha Ranji Cricket Team and title sponsorship of Odisha Premier League, 2011.

On August 29, CBI had filed a supplementary chargesheet against Behera alleging that as secretary of Odisha Cricket Association he entered into a criminal conspiracy with Artha Tatwa chit fund company to raise its credibility in the eyes of general public and get more people invested in the different schemes floated by it.

The company is under CBI probe since 2014 for cheating thousands of ordinary people in Odisha who had deposited their money in its funds-multiplier schemes.

CBI SP Jay Narayan Rana to reporters, “The arrests were made on the basis of a non-bailable warrant issued by a CBI court where Behera and the others are facing charges. He, however, declined to elaborate on the case and the accusations.

CBI sleuths reached Behera’s house in Cuttack in the morning and arrested him. He was brought to the CBI office in Bhubaneswar, where he and Das were grilled by the investigators for about two hours before being presented at a CBI special court.

Kamalakant Das had allegedly entered into dubious land deals with AT Group owner Pradeep Sethy, who had given him power of attorney for 2.5 acres of land in Balasore and 8.5 acres in Bhubaneswar. Das had then sold these two plots for about Rs 1.10 crore.

After a 16-year-long reign in Odisha cricket as the secretary of Odisha Cricket Association (OCA), Behera had stepped down from the post in 2016 for being above the age of 70. The Supreme Court-appointed Justice Lodha Committee had recommended that the age of office bearers of cricket bodies must be limited to 70.

“This arrest is nothing other than a pressure tactic on us days before the elections for OCA. We will not be bowed down by such tactics. We have full faith in the judiciary,” said Behera’s son, Sanjay Behera, who is reportedly eyeing the post of secretary of OCA in the elections scheduled to be held on September 28.

CBI had first registered a case against Behera in June 2017 after raiding his residence and the OCA office in connection with allegations that he colluded with the AT Group, which is one of 44 chit fund companies in the state being probed by CBI since 2014. The AT Group had collected nearly Rs 500 crore from small investors through attractive schemes that promised returns as high as 15 to 20 per cent of the deposits.

Behera was also charged under PMLA by Enforcement Directorate (ED) in December 2017 for encroaching a prime plot of government land near Cuttack’s Barabati Stadium and using it for his personal business interests. The ED case has Behera’s son Sanjay Behera as an accused as his firm had built a wedding ceremony mandap and ran several business units on the encroached land.