Sebi bill to tackle ponzi schemes moved in RS

The crucial Sebi Bill aimed at tackling various ponzi schemes and providing more teeth to the financial sector regulator to crackdown on such fraudulent investment schemes was taken up in the Rajya Sabha today.
Moving the Bill, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said the law essentially deals with ponzi schemes and would strengthen SEBI's hands to deal with them, besides ensuring speedy trial of cases by setting up various courts.
The Securities Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2014, has been brought in the backdrop of lakhs of small investors being duped by fraudulent investment schemes like in the alleged Saradha scam.
The new law will empower Sebi investigators to conduct searches and seek information from suspected entities, both within and outside the country. However, as a safeguard, any search operation can be conducted only after approval of a designated court set up by the government in Mumbai.

The Bill aims to empower the capital market watchdog Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) by giving powers such as authority to seek call data records.
Jaitley said previous Finance Minister P Chidambaram had proposed that SEBI could have power to conduct search operations without permission, even though the original bill had a provision that it could conduct such operations after seeking permission of the area Magistrate.

The new government has proposed some changes and a designated court has been earmarked in Mumbai for the purpose.
An ordinance to empower Sebi to deal with ponzi schemes was promulgated thrice during the previous UPA regime but it could not be converted into an Act.

Jaitley said as per the new Bill, the profits earned out of illegal activities will be confiscated and used for investor protection fund to create investor awareness.
The bill was passed by Lok Sabha last week.