Just a few hours after CRB Capital Markets downed its shutters, brokers in the city have gone overboard offering `innovative' schemes to bail out hapless investors. One such scheme is the Fixed Deposit Investor Protection Organisation floated by Delhi-based Lakshmi Finance, a leading broking outfit which aggressively marketed CRB's fixed deposit programmes. To enroll in the organisation, the company is charging a fee of Rs 1,000-5,000 from investors depending on the deposit amount. For instance, investors with FDRs worth Rs 10,000-30,000, will have to cough up Rs 1,000 to become a member. The minimum enrollment fee is Rs 500. According to the company official, the group of aggrieved investors so formed will fight the case in the court of law within a day or two and has already retained a lawyer for the same. The money being collected through cheques in the name of Lakshmi Finance will have to paid once the case is filed.

While the company claims the charges are towards legal expenses, some investors feel it is yet another way of minting money from the beleaguered investors. In the first two days itself, the company has enrolled around 250 members, which means a minimum of Rs 2.5 lakh into the kitty once the case is filed. The figures are likely to swell as more and more investors enroll in the organisation. Some depositors view with skepticism the organisation floated by Lakshmi Finance as they feel it is only trying to cover up its losses which run into several crores of rupees (including brokerage and financing of FDs).

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.