Not a scam, say Social Trade investors

New Delhi: As government agencies probe what is believed to be one of the biggest Ponzi scams to surface in recent times, thousands of its investors congregated in Delhi to voice their support for a scheme that helped them make money and which they believe is perfectly legitimate.

Vikas Gupta, who runs a store that sells broadband internet devices, was among around 4,000 Social Trade investors who had landed up at Jantar Mantar on Sunday afternoon. Many of them carried placards in support of Anubhav Mittal, the founder of Social Trade that promised returns for hitting likes on online links.

Gupta, who is from Meerut, said, “I had a sale of maximum 50 connections a month. Last year, I took a subscription of Rs 57,500 (from Social Trade) and within a few days my sales increased three times.”

There were several such instances, of people who had promoted their business on the Social Trade platform. This indicated that what Mittal had come up with was a digital marketing platform that brought a consumer and advertiser together, offering the former cash incentives for hitting likes and getting more mileage in the process.

UP Police’s special task force (STF), which is investigating the Ponzi scheme, has said the entire operation was a sham and the only money Social Trade raised was through subscriptions. This explains why just a fraction benefited, like a typical pyramid scheme. Social Trade had more than 6. 5 lakh subscribers. Till Saturday, the STF had received 2,500 complaints, including from Oman and Nigeria.

But the protesters were quite happy with the performance of Social Trade, saying Mittal had generated employment. Ashutosh (28) and Palak (27), workers at a medical store, said, “We took the subscription in September last year, and soon after, we saw a big increase in our sale.”

Kushagra Dagra (24), a property dealer, said, “The company works on a barter system and I am here to support Mittal. I own an association which does property dealing and I saw a surge in my customers after the subscription.”

Some said Mittal followed the same practices as any digital marketing company does but offered more attractive rates. “He always fulfilled his promises and the arrest was a conspiracy by a competitor company,” claimed one.