SIMS Agent Committs Suicide

Secured Investment Making Services (SIMS) India Private Ltd. agent Sathyababu today committed suicide, after the scam by the chit fund was uncovered yesterday. Overcome by depositors hounding him, and his own loss of the heavy deposits he had made at SIMS, Sathyababu committed suicide on railway tracks near Anakapalle.

Tragically, Sathyababu had also made deposits worth Rs. 16 lakhs in another chit fund called Radha, which had also shut shop a month back.

SIMS, a multi-level marketing company, which had opened up three-years ago in Visakhapatnam, attracted thousands of customers in the region with promises of heavy returns on small investments. Most of the depositors are of middle and lower-middle income classes, who put most of their savings, several going so far as to pawn gold jewellery, into the funds.

Everything was good for a while, with the money coming in as regularly as clockwork. For the past 4 months, though, the customers started noticing irregularities in the interest paid to them. It all came to a head when they were all called to the head office to collect their dues, only to find the all of the top level; management had absconded.

The money cheated out of the people is estimated to be more than Rs. 500 crores.