Sebi to get access to call records

Move to help nab violators in critical cases such as insider trading

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) may soon get one of its long-pending demands as the government is likely to include its name in the list of agencies authorised to access telephone call records of individuals from the service providers.

A notification to this effect is likely to be issued shortly, according to people familiar with the development.

Sebi has been demanding this access for a while now as telecom companies stopped giving the data citing a departmental notification that lists the agencies which are authorised to seek such data. Sebi did not figure on that list.

 

Access to call data is different from interception of calls, which the US Securities and Exchange Commission had used to crack the high profile insider trading cases involving former McKinsey chief Rajat Gupta and hedge fund promoter Raj Rajaratnam.

In the silver jubilee celebrations of the regulator held in Mumbai on Friday, the prime minister had called for rooting out of insider trading and promised to "do everything" to strengthen Sebi so that it can deliver more effective enforcement." Providing access to call records would be one of the first measures in that direction.

Though the demand is at least a few years' old, definite signals that government is keen to act came in November.

The government is making an arrangement for market regulator Sebi getting access to call data records of people being probed by it in specific cases, but it will not get power to directly tap the phone calls, Finance Minister P Chidambaram had said in November.

"... Some arrangement is being made that the call data records will be supplied through the agencies entitled to get them to Sebi," Chidambaram had said.

Sebi chairman UK Sinha has been reiterating the importance of these records as they will help establish that two people were in regular contact before an act of violation. It could also prove to be a handy evidence during interrogation