Multi-crore Pappula Chitti scam: 3 held in Vizianagaram, items worth Rs. 8 crs seized

Vizianagaram: In a breakthrough in the multi-crore cheating case, the Vizianagaram police have arrested three persons who cheated around 24,000 people in the name of AR Benefit Food Sankranti Kanuka, famously known as Pappula Chitti, of more than Rs. 8 crores.

The Vizianagaram police chief, Deepika M. Patil, said they have recovered items valued at Rs. 1.28 crores from the arrested persons who have been identified as Majji Appala Raju of Kondakarakam village, Pativada Srilekha of Kondagumpam, and Majji Ramesh of Kondkarakam village.

The police seized gold ornaments, Rs. 44.12 lakhs cash, and land documents valued at Rs. 29.95 lakhs from the accused. Five bank accounts worth Rs. 39.06 lakhs were frozen. The police also found 16 vehicles and two water plants in the name of the accused persons.

Ms. Deepika said the three persons, including a woman, collected money from the public in the name of Sankranti Pappula Chitti in which the organisers would give 24 varieties of groceries before Sankranti. For this, each member had to pay Rs. 300 per month for a year. They collected Rs. 3,600 from each person in the past 12 months.

They started the scheme in 2021 and successfully handed over groceries last year by appointing 189 agents across undivided Vizianagaram district. This encouraged more people to invest. More than 24,000 people became members and paid Rs. 8.09 crores in the last 12 months. When the organisers did not hand over the groceries to members, many of them lodged complaints at the Gurla police station.

"Our investigation revealed that the main accused, Majji Appala Raju, invested Rs. 3.5 crores in a water plant in Vijayawada, but it was not grounded in time and he failed to deliver the groceries to the members. We will hand over the properties to the court and distribute them with the permission of the court," the police chief said. The DGP has appointed special officers to investigate the case. He appointed additional SP rank officer Srinivasa Rao and DSP rank officer Arjuna Rao to investigation the case, the police chief added.