Supreme Court issues notice on chit fund regulation

The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued notice to the Centre, Reserve Bank of India and Securities and Exchange Board of India seeking their response on a public interest litigation for putting in place a proper mechanism to regulate functioning of chit funds in the country.

A bench headed by Chief Justice P Sathasivam asked the government and the institutions to file their response within four weeks on a plea filed by an NGO.

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Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the non-government organisation, Humanity Salt Lake, submitted that there has been inaction on the part of the government in regulating chit funds resulting in multiple scams across the country.

He submitted that chit fund companies were collecting money from the public in violation of laws and that needed to be checked.

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The petitioner referred to various chit fund scams, including the recent multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam in West Bengal, and pleaded before the apex court for its intervention in the matter to prevent recurrence of such cases.

After hearing the submissions, the bench agreed to look into the matter.