Informist, Friday, Sep 27, 2024

NEW DELHI – The Public Accounts Committee of Parliament has asked Securities and Exchange Board of India Chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch to attend its meeting on Oct 4 to review the annual accounts of the capital markets regulator, a source said. The committee wants to quiz Buch on the regulator's accounts for at least the last two financial years, the source added.

As per Section 15 of the SEBI Act, "the accounts of the board as certified by the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India or any other person appointed by him in this behalf together with the audit report thereon shall be forwarded annually to the Central government and that government shall cause the same to be laid before each house of Parliament."

The committee, which had on Aug 29 made a suo-moto decision to review SEBI's performance, is headed by Congress Lok Sabha member K.C. Venugopal and comprises members from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party as well as Opposition parties. Its listed agenda for the meeting is "Briefing by Audit followed by Oral evidence of the representatives of Ministry of Finance (Department of Revenue) on the subject 'Compliance Audit of Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC)' based on C&AG report."

The parliamentary panel's decision to call Buch comes amid a huge controversy and a growing demand from the opposition for a parliamentary probe into US-based Hindenburg Research's allegation that Buch and her husband, Dhaval Buch, had "hidden stakes in the exact same obscure offshore Bermuda and Mauritius funds, found in the same complex nested structure, used by Vinod Adani". Hindenburg Research's report, published on Aug 10, was followed by further allegations by the Congress party, which claimed that Buch received a fee from her consultancy services company Agora Advisory while working at SEBI. Buch, who has faced calls to resign, has denied all the allegations. End

Reported by Kuldeep Singh

Edited by Tanima Banerjee

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