Bombay HC stays order directing FIR against ex-Sebi chief Madhabi Puri Buch, others in stock market ‘fraud’ | Mumbai News
The Bombay High Court on Tuesday granted a four-week stay on a special court’s directive to file an FIR against former Sebi chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch and five other officials in connection with alleged stock market fraud and regulatory violations. The court noted that the special court had issued its order mechanically without examining the details or assigning specific roles to the accused.
Justice Shivkumar Dige, presiding over a single-judge bench, observed that the special court’s March 1 order lacked detailed reasoning. “Hence, the order is stayed till the next hearing. The complainant, Sapan Shrivastava, is granted four weeks to file an affidavit in response to the petitions,” the court ruled says PTI reports.
The high court’s decision came in response to petitions filed by Buch, three current SEBI whole-time directors—Ashwani Bhatia, Ananth Narayan G, and Kamlesh Chandra Varshney—as well as two BSE officials, Managing Director and CEO Sundararaman Ramamurthy, and former chairman and public interest director Pramod Agarwal. The petitions sought the quashing of the special court’s order, which had instructed the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to register an FIR over alleged financial fraud linked to the 1994 listing of a company on the BSE.
The petitioners argued that the special court’s order was arbitrary and legally flawed. The case originated from a complaint by Sapan Shrivastava, a media reporter, who accused the officials of involvement in large-scale financial fraud, regulatory breaches, and corruption.
The case will now be reviewed in the upcoming hearing.
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