Supreme Court turns down scamster’s plea to club FIRs | India News
New Delhi: The Supreme Court Friday said it will not order FIRs against the man accused of defrauding thousands of investors across the state while rejecting an appeal by Samir Agarwal of Saga Group, who fled to Dubai after misappropriating the maturity amount of Rs 10,000 crore of depositors in a cooperative society.Appearing for the absconding accused, senior advocate R Vasant told a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Jayamalaya Bagchir that the court had in the past merged FIRs if they were to avoid traveling from state to state to attend the trial of the accused on the same basic charge.CJI Kant said, when a person cheats thousands of investors, each incident becomes the subject of an independent FIR. There are 33 FIRs against Agarwal in UP, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh and Haryana for failing to pay maturity amounts to depositors.“Clubbing of FIRs is a gift to the accused. Those who have been duped have to travel long distances to testify in court while the accused enjoy sitting in one place. The investigating agency should fake this person and bring him to India to face trial,” it said. “If a group of cheated people come together to collect FIRs, the court will take cognizance. Our approach must be victim-centric.” It said that if the accused deposits Rs 10,000 crore for refund, the court will consider his plea.
