The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday carried out searches at 10 premises across Odisha and West Bengal in a money-laundering case involving Kalpana Financial Services Private Limited and its director Amit Mandal, the agency said in an official statement.

Source: IANS

The searches were conducted by the ED's Bhubaneswar zonal office under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002. The ED said the case was initiated on the basis of an FIR registered by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Odisha Police.

Source: ANI via Devdiscourse

What the ED alleges

According to the ED, the alleged investment fraud was operated principally under the name Kalpana Financial Services, in which members of the public were induced to invest money on representations that the funds would be deployed in share-market and trading activities and would yield fixed monthly returns ranging from approximately 3.5 per cent to 7 per cent. Through the scheme, around Rs 120 crore was collected from the public, the agency said.

Mandal, a resident of South Boilapara under the Bishnupur police station area in West Bengal's Bankura district, was arrested by the EOW in December 2025 following a complaint by a resident of Odisha's Khordha district.

How the scheme allegedly worked

The EOW found during its investigation that Mandal allegedly collected more than Rs 120 crore between 2020 and 2024 from around 500 depositors in Odisha and 100 depositors in West Bengal, and that more than Rs 40 crore of the invested amount was due to be returned. According to the ED statement, the monthly returns were paid from the successive deposits of new depositors.

In 2023, the accused allegedly failed to pay the returns and falsely assured depositors that their money would be reinvested in his newly formed company, Kalpamit Consultancy Private Limited, before he absconded, the agency said.