hyderabad the residents of the old city continue to be the victims of finance firms which have been collecting deposits from them while exploiting their religious sentiments after being duped by at least a dozen firms who offered them halaal munafa interestfree profit in 1998 the old city residents now top the list of victims of the charminar bank debacle firms such as alfalah company asanzubi groupawad group and jawedaan group collected huge amounts from the depositors while offering them halaal munafa up to 5 per cent a month on their deposits carried away by their advertisements in the leading vernacular dailies hundreds of people deposited their savings with such firms to get more profit which was also halaal but within a year all the firms went bankrupt resulting in people losing their hardearned money similarly the charminar bank too strengthened its base more or less on religious sentimentswhen the old city residents were yet to recover from the disaster of the finance companies a massive publicity campaign was launched by charminar bank chairman syed alamdar hussain sajjad aga in 1998 projecting the bank as an institution belonging to the muslim community being associated with the shia sect he made it almost mandatory for all shia muslims to become a share holder in the bank such was his campaign that there is a shareholder in each of the house in the noor khan bazar darulshifa hussaini mohalla bibikaalawa and other shia dominated areas surprisingly most of the people who led such finance firms including the charminar bank successfully tried to project themselves as philanthropists and they attended innumerable public functions as chief guests sajjad aga was among other chief guests along with chief minister n chandrababu naidu in a mushaira in the old city in september 2000 which was organised to raise funds for a charitable eye hospital it is learnt that of the total deposits in the charminar bank at least rs 100 crore was deposited by the old city residents including families whose relatives work in the gulf countries good business charminar bank was projected as a muslim institution to get deposits shias sect were convinced to become share holders in the bank charminar bank was projected as a muslim institution to get deposits