Sebi ups reach for arbitration centers

Arbitration currently available at Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad,Kanpur and Indore

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has decided to extend the reach of the arbitration centers by asking exchanges to double their number within a year.

Arbitration is currently available at eight centers. These include Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad,Kanpur and Indore. Exchanges have now been asked to provide arbitration facilities at Bangalore, Pune, Jaipur, Gaziabad, Lucknow, Gurgaon, Patna and Vadodara.

An arbitration centre is a place where disputes between brokers and their clients are resolved. Disputes could be on issues such as a client alleging that the broker has traded in his account without his permission.

Sebi in March had announced a common pool of arbitrators to decide on such disputes. It also addressed conflicts of interest by arbitrators in the earlier circular, asking that they decline to examine issues where such conflicts may exist.

The regulator has asked the first four of the new centers to be established before December 31, 2013.The latter are to be put in place by June 30, 2014.

“Increasing the number of centres shall reduce the travelling and other incidental costs to investors in case they choose to avail these facilities,” said the Sebi circular on Friday.

“The arbitration and appellate arbitration shall be conducted at the centre nearest to the address provided by Client in the KYC (Know Your Client) form,” said another circular, also released on Friday.