Sebi slaps Rs 50 lakh fine on person for fraudulent practices

Capital market regulator Sebi today imposed a penalty of Rs 50 lakh on an individual for alleged fraudulent and unfair trade activities in shares of three companies during the period 2008-09.
The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has slapped "a penalty of Rs 50 lakh" on Deepak Khurana, who was heading a branch of Religare Securities in Delhi.
Khurana had allegedly aided and abetted one Pooja Menghani in her front running in shares of -- Amtek Auto, Amtek India, Ahmednagar Forgings and Monnet Ispat.
"...It is clear that noticee (Khurana) had aided and abetted Pooja by communicating the information with regard to the large buy orders received from the Live Star Marketing, SRS Portfolio and MSR Marketing (the major buyers), who taking advantage of the said information, had placed buy orders through the noticee at the lower price and subsequently sold them at higher price and thereby made gains," Sebi said in an order today.

"The said mechanism / artifice / practice (front running) adopted by Pooja and the noticee is certainly an illegal / fraudulent / unfair / manipulative mechanism," it added.
Sebi had conducted an investigation relating to the trading of Pooja Menghani during the period June 1, 2008 to January 12, 2009 in the shares of the four companies.
The investigation found that Pooja had done front running in the four company scrips by obtaining prior knowledge of large buy orders to be placed by -- Live Star Marketing, SRS Portfolio and MSR Marketing.