Securities Appellate Tribunal will hear RIL's plea against Sebi on June 14

The Securities Appellate Tribunal or SAT has asked the Securities and Exchange Board of India to file its reply within four weeks why it is opposing a petition by Reliance Industries against the capital market regulator's refusal to settle a case of alleged insider trading through consent. The case relates to alleged violation of insider trading norms in the sale of shares of the company's erstwhile subsidiary Reliance Petroleum Limited in 2007. Sebi has opposed RIL's plea saying it is up to the regulator to decide on acceptance or rejection of a consent application. On Monday, presiding officer PK Malhotra and member of tribunal Jog Singh set the date of hearing on 14 June after hearing both sides. "We have not been given adequate inspection of the documents," said Janak Dwarkadas, senior counsel representing billionaire Mukesh Ambani in the case. "Also, the manner in which company's consent application has been rejected by regulator is incorrect." Darius Khambatta, Advocate General Maharashtra, representing Sebi argued, "The high-power committee recommendation for rejection of consent is based on fact that entities involved had dealt in shares in the last 10 minutes of trade and made profit of around Rs 5300000000." Many cases, including those related to insider trading are not being considered for settlement through consent mechanism after May 2012 after Sebi tightened the norms. Earlier, on January 3, the market regulator had come out with the list of 149 consent applications, including 16 related to the RIL group, which it had found unsuitable for the settlement through consent term.