MP plans special courts to probe ICD scam

The total loan amount was Rs 714 crore but the sum to be recovered has now risen close to Rs 2200 crore,including interests.

Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said the defaulters will be blacklisted and cases of fraud registered against them. He described as insufficient the efforts made so far to recover the money from defaulters.

The Congress,for its part,has always argued that it was more a case of non-performing assets than any scam.

The scheme had started in 1998 and 56 industries and companies were advanced loans by Madhya Pradesh State Industrial Development Corporation MPSIDC Ltd.

The money loaned to the industries was raised by the Corporation through bonds. Banks,including cooperative banks,based outside Madhya Pradesh had invested in the bonds lured by the promise of a hefty interest rate.

Some of the beneficiaries arrived at a one-time settlement offered by the state government along the way but as many as 29 of them still owe the government hundreds of crore.

The states economic offences bureau had initiated a probe into the scam after the BJP came to power in 2003.

However,the matter got attention when former Chief Minister Uma Bharati played the role of an Opposition after she was thrown out of the BJP in 2005.