The Bombay High Court on Tuesday stayed a special court’s order directing the registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against former SEBI Chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch and other officials from SEBI and the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) in connection with a listing fraud case.
The Court observed that the special court had issued the order without thoroughly examining the details or assigning specific roles to Buch and the other accused.
Justice SG Dige, a single judge, granted relief after Buch and two others challenged the order in the High Court.
“The complainant seeks time to file a reply. After hearing all parties, it appears the judge issued the order mechanically, without delving into details or attributing any role to the applicants. Hence, the order is stayed,” the High Court ruled.
The case pertained to a special court’s directive to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to register an FIR against Buch and five others over alleged irregularities in a company’s 1994 listing on the BSE. Sapan Shrivastava, a journalist from Dombivli, had filed a complaint under Section 156(3) of the CrPC, alleging that SEBI officials conspired to approve the listing of a company in 1994 without ensuring adherence to regulatory standards. He claimed that despite filing multiple complaints with SEBI and law enforcement agencies, no action was taken, prompting him to seek judicial intervention.
As per the complaint, the accused SEBI officials and BSE executives failed to implement crucial provisions of the SEBI Act, 1992, along with the SEBI (Issue of Capital and Disclosure Requirements) Regulations, 2018, and the SEBI (Listing Obligations and Disclosure Requirements) Regulations, 2015.
In addition to Buch, the special court had ordered an FIR against SEBI whole-time members Ashwani Bhatia, Ananth Narayan G, and Kamlesh Chandra Varshney, as well as BSE officials Pramod Agarwal and Sundararaman Ramamurthy.
Buch, Bhatia, and Agarwal subsequently approached the High Court to challenge the order.
