SBI on 'weak grounds' over opaque funds: Cong T

Press Trust of India 

New Delhi 

The Congress on Tuesday alleged that a rule prohibiting investment by opaque funds was done away with by SEBI on "weak grounds" and said the market regulator cannot run with the hares by diluting reporting requirements and hunt with the hounds pretending to identify beneficial ownership in opaque tax havens.

The Opposition party's assertion came after a media report claimed that the Supreme Court-appointed committee scrutinised SEBI's dropping of a key regulatory requirement for foreign portfolio investments (FPIs) months before it developed suspicions on Adani group shareholding. In a statement, Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said it is now clear that, far from a clean chit, the Supreme Court expert committee on the "Modani mega scam" has unveiled how Securities and Exchange Board of India's (SEBI) investigation of suspicious Adani transactions have been blocked or reached an impasse, which is why the market regulator's report deadline was extended to August 14.

The expert committee had revealed that this was partly of SEBI's own making, after the regulator did away with the requirement on identifying the ultimate beneficial owner of foreign funds and deleted provisions on "opaque structures", Ramesh said.

"This despite PM (Narendra) Modi's frequent and evidently empty rhetoric against black money and offshore tax havens," he added. Posting his statement, Ramesh tweeted, "Here is my statement on the latest revelation this morning on the Modani MegaScam which gets curiouser and curiouser by the day as new information trickles out."