Mumbai, Oct 28 (IANS): With over 200 panicky customers lodging police complaints against them, the missing owners of jewellery chain Goodwin Group, A. M. Sunilkumar and A.M. Sudheerkumar, on Monday released a video message on social media, claiming they were targeted by extortionists and have hence gone "underground".

The duo has claimed that contrary to rumours, they are not "absconding" but merely staying put in a safe place from the alleged extortionists who have demanded a huge sum of money from them

They also assured the anxious customers not to worry as they will repay all their dues, but argued that if they were put behind bars by the police, they would be unable to mobilise their resources to clear all outstandings.

Seeking to ally the customers' fears, the brothers assured in their video-message that they "will live and die in Maharashtra", will not run away, but would soon dispose off all their properties to repay the customers' outstanding dues.

While Sunilkumar is the Managing Director of Goodwin Group, his brother is a Director in the family-run concern and police are currently on the lookout for both.

A large number of customers staged a demonstration for the second day on Monday after the jewellery firm suddenly shut down its outlets in Thane and Mumbai and 10 other cities in Maharashtra, besides Kerala and the Middle East.

The owners seemed to have disappeared suddenly leaving in the lurch thousands who have invested crores of rupees in the company's schemes.

The company offered attractive returns on fixed and gold deposits, higher than bank rates, to the customers and many people were lured to invest anywhere from Rs 20,000 to Rs 5 million.

The alleged scam tumbled out late last week when the customers, who turned up to get back the promised returns and their investments, found the jewellery stores shut and nobody available to answer queries, after which the people approached the local police.