The KOUP Scam

 Sometime in 2009, one of Ranjeet’s man approached me to invest into their latest venture known as Koperasi Usahawan Putrajaya Berhad or in short KOUP. This co-operative society is being promoted like a bank where Ranjeet is saying that KOUP is “regulated” by the Suruhanjaya Koperasi Malaysia (SKM) and that KOUP is similar to Bank Rakyat. Additionally I was informed that all investment in KOUP is protected by an international insurance scheme. This investment was touted as risk free and delivers minimum return of 8.4% per annum but could even reach as high as 18% per annum should I agree to invest $2mil or more.  

      This was quoted right out of the letter accompanying the prospectus of KOUP that was given to me:  

All deposits made into KOUP Berhad  are principal protected in that there will be investment grade  sovereign and quasi-sovereign fixed income derived instruments, managed by Merrill Lynch invested by Peninsula Investment House. These investments are to be held for the benefit of KOUP Berhad to protect all deposits made to KOUP Berhad  KOUP Berhad will pay a fee for Peninsula Investment House to  place the assets in Merrill  Lynch. Upon maturity of these investments these instruments will have par value. 

 

Although I was ready to invest, some unforeseen cash flow issue cropped whereby I had to use some of my savings for my son who was in the US. Looking back, this was the best thing that happened to me and saved me additional heart ache.  

 

See the key people of KOUP below:

 

Little did I know at that time that, just a few months after the launch of KOUP, the government discovered the scam and took appropriate action by freezing KOUP's activities. I only became aware of this in 2015 through investigations carried out by my ex-CCID friend. He showed me newspaper clippings he obtained from an ex-government officer named Hajjah Aminah, who lost almost $200k in the KOUP scam. At that time, she was 62 years old, and I don't have her contact details, but I believe she had lodged complaints with both SKM and the police. However, no action was taken. She had never met or personally knew Ranjeet, but she had encountered Jespall Singh and Cikgu Rahman. Although Cikgu Rahman introduced her to Jesspal and KOUP, she later learned that Cikgu Rahman himself lost $60k in the scam. Based on the information gathered, it appears that over 200 KOUP members and investors were cheated, totaling more than $88 million. By the time SKM intervened in late 2009, there was very little money left in KOUP's account. Although I did not invest any money in KOUP, the story of victims in KOUP is similar to mine. We were duped by this conman Ranjeet and when the axe fell, the big boss Rashpal had managed to pull enough string to close the matter without any action whatsoever. This is despite the fact that SKM had deemed that KOUP was a Ponzi Scam and its accounts were frozen and offices raided. 

 

https://forum.lowyat.net/topic/1012455/all

The above is the official statement from SKM in Jan 2010 and no action was taken against Ranjeet or Rashpal not to the management executive committee of KOUP consisting of Ranjeet’s father (Ir. Sukhdev Singh Sidhu), brother (Sarjeet Singh Sidhu) and cousin Jespal Singh Dhaliwall. According to what we understand from Satpal’s cousin, all the funds were siphoned from KOUP were split between Ranjeet, Rashpal and Jesspal. 

 

Below is the Malay Mail article dated 1^st Dec 2009 from Hajjah Aminah