The chitfund fraudsters did not even spare sex workers in West Bengal. Trapped by the cheats to invest their hard- earned savings in ponzi schemes, thousands of sex workers in the state’s red- light districts have lost crores of rupees.
A majority of investments were made in the Saradha Group, which is under the scanner for defrauding lakhs of investors.
According to a survey conducted by an NGO, as many as 16,000 sex workers in 59 red- light pockets had invested more than ` 9 crore with various chitfund companies.
“We conducted the survey at Sonagachi — the infamous red- light district in Kolkata — Bowbazaar, Kalighat- Chetla, Khidirpur, Sheoraphuli, Titagarh, Asansol, Durgapur and many other pockets. Though it is difficult to give the exact figure, the chitfund company agents had amassed more than ` 9 crore over the past three years from about 16,000 sex workers,” said Bharati Dey, secretary of Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee.
Durbar is an exclusive forum of 65000- odd female, male and transgender sex workers in the state. Dey said in Sonagachi alone, about 3,000 sex workers invested more than ` 1.5 crore in Saradha’s savings and deposit schemes.
“ We noticed a sudden drop in our daily collective schemes since 2009- 10. The sex workers had started depositing their money with chitfund companies like Saradha Group, Rose Valley and Sahara’s schemes, expecting a sky- high return,” Dey said.
According to sources, the sex workers used to deposit their savings with the Usha Cooperative Society, but the contributions significantly declined over the past three years. Registered in 1995, Usha is the first sex workers’ cooperative in Asia run by Durbar to fight sex workers’ economic exclusion from government and other financial institutions.
When the representatives of Usha looked into the matter, they found that the chitfund companies were collecting daily savings deposits from the sex workers. And it was some of the Usha agents only who had helped them sneak in. “ We came to know that six of our Usha agents were working on the sly for Saradha and collecting deposits for the company. We expelled them and logged an FIR against some of them,” said Dey.
The money collection racket for chitfunds started with the help of some influential pimps and strongmen. “ We had no option but to do what they said.
If we don’t listen to them, they will disturb our business,” said Priyanka ( name changed), a sex worker at Sonagachi.
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