The return of trust

A new, evolving framework for returning money to victims is reshaping the Enforcement Directorate’s response to financial fraud

- BY KANU SARDA AND PREMA RAJARAM

For years, victims of financial fraud have heard the same reassurance from investigators: assets have been attached, properties seized and the accused prosecuted.

Yet for homebuyers, depositors and investors who lost their life savings in real-estate frauds, chit fund collapses, investment schemes and banking scams, a simple question remained: when will the money recovered be returned to us?

Few understand that frustration better than Sumit Raghav. When he booked a flat in an SRS Group project in Faridabad in 2012, he believed he was making the most important investment of his life. Like thousands of middle-class Indians, he carefully planned his finances, availed a home loan and looked forward to moving his family into a house he could finally call his own. Possession was promised within a few years.

That day never came.

More than a decade later, Raghav is still waiting. The project became entangled in investigations, the promoters landed in legal trouble, properties were attached and construction ground to a halt. Through it all, he continued paying both rent and EMIs. “Every year we thought possession would happen soon. Instead, we spent years moving between courts, government offices and authorities looking for answers,” he says.

Raghav’s story reflects a recurring pattern across India. Victims spend their savings believing they are buying a home, investing for the future or securing their family’s financial well-being. When the schemes collapse, they are often left waiting for years while the wheels of the justice system turn slowly.