Sebi bars Mathur from holding office

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) today barred former executive director of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) R C Mathur from holding any public position in a capital market related institution for a period of three years and declared him ineligible to become an office bearer of any stock exchange. The SEBI move follows investigations into alleged price manipulations in the scrips of BPL, Videocon and Sterlite in the wake of the payment crisis on the BSE in May last year. The regulator had indicted him for his “failure to discharge his duties and responsibilities in an objective and professional manner.” The SEBI had earlier sacked former BSE president J C Parekh for the same reasons. The matter was contested by him and still stands pending with the Mumbai High Court. “It was found that his conduct in the context of developments related to these scrips was detrimental to the transparency, integrity and fairness of the system,” SEBI said. Pursuant to investigations of thefunctioning of exchanges and their office bearers, show cause notices were issued to Parekh, former BSE vice president Rajendra K Banthia and Mathur for their role in influencing the exchange administration. Sebi had asked Mathur to appear before it. Mathur sought inspection of certain documents but then did not turn up for some hearings. After Parekh’s appeal was rejected by the appellate authority, Mathur decided to step down from the post of executive director. Sebi officials had then made it clear that the probe against Mathur would not be discontinued following his decision to step down and would be taken to its logical conclusion. Highly-placed Sebi sources said that Mathur is alleged to be more guilty than Parekh who was sacked and barred from holding a position in a capital market related position for three years.