The Securities Appellate Tribunal in its recent order has refused to grant immediate relief to Eros International Media Limited and its certain executives against an ad-interim ex-parte order of SEBI.
The SAT however directed the appellants to file their reply / objections along with a stay vacation application before the Whole-Time Member (WTM), SEBI within three weeks and directed the WTM to fix a date of hearing within a week from filing of such reply / objection and thereafter to pass an order within three weeks from the hearing after considering the material evidence placed before the WTM.
In this background, the views of Mr. Sumit Agrawal, Managing Partner Regstreet Law Advisors have been featured in an article by the The Economic Times.
Mr. Sumit Agrawal who was formerly a SEBI officer has observed that โIn its recent ruling concerning both Eros and Zee, SAT has unambiguously established that a post-decisional hearing is adequate in instances of ex-parte interim orders, provided that the nature of the case justifies such an order. These rulings also emphasize that the burden rests of the noticees to demonstrate that these orders are excessively severe and disproportionate to the alleged infractions.
He was further also of the view that โthis is particularly crucial when the interest of investors are at stake. In previous instances, such as the Arshad Warsi case, SAT has delimited the scope of SEBI’s orders. However, this was only achievable when the noticees successfully proved the disproportionate nature of SEBI’s original order, leading SAT to issue its own directive.โ
The The Economic Times article is enclosed below:
Readers are also welcome to send their views to Regstreet Law Advisors at info@regstreetlaw.com
