sebi:RA/DPS/137/2017

SEBI · SEBI · 2016-01-12 · Rachna Anand, Adjudicating Officer

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Facts / Headnote

Adjudicating Proceedings disposed of without penalty

Provisions invoked

• s. 15J
• s. 15A
• s. 15F
• s. 15C

Parties

• M/s India Infoline Finance Ltd

Holding

The Adjudicating Officer disposed of the adjudication proceedings initiated against India Infoline Finance Ltd under Section 15C of the SEBI Act without imposing any penalty, finding that the Noticee had taken adequate steps for redressal of investor grievances and that delays were attributable to complainant conduct.

Full text

Adjudication Order in respect of M/s India Infoline Finance Ltd Page 2 of 9 Clause 13: “Failure by listed companies and SEBI registered intermediaries to file ATR under SCORES within thirty days of date of receipt of the grievance shall not only be treated as failure to furnish information to SEBI but shall also be deemed to constitute non-redressal of investor grievance.”

Adjudication Order in respect of M/s India Infoline Finance Ltd Page 3 of 9 if any, should not be imposed on the noticee under Section 15C of the SEBI Act for the violations alleged to have been committed by the Noticee. The said SCN was duly delivered to the Noticee on February 8, 2016 through the Department of Post. Noticee vide letter dated February 22, 2016 had submitted its reply in the matter, which inter alia stated as under: “……………….  India Infoline Finance Ltd is large NBFC-ND-SI registered with the Reserve Bank of India and has over 150,000 of Debenture holders under the various series of Debentures who are serviced in a timely manner. The Company has a dedicated system of ensuring timely allotment of Debentures, processing of refund orders, issue of certificates, demat credit, payment of interest, etc and also redressing investor’s queries/ complaints in a time bound manner.  As regard the Show Cause Notice (SCN), at the outset we would like to submit that as per the SCORES data available on the SEBI portal, the status of both the complaints as mentioned in the SCN is appearing as disposed off and treated as closed as of May 12, 2015 and March 26, 2015 respectively. The disposal and closure of referred two matters were over 8 months before the competent Authority’s decision on adjudication in these matters. Accordingly, initiation of adjudication proceeding and SCN seems to be unjustified.  We submit the chronology of events and details of the complaints as foll

Adjudication Order in respect of M/s India Infoline Finance Ltd Page 4 of 9  The Company had furnished a copy of the communication sent to the Investor vide its ATR dated May 3, 2014 to which the SEBI had sought clarification on payment of interest for delay of 3 months. The Company submitted its response explaining that payment of refund was delayed on account of wrong pincode quoted by the Investor in the Application Form while subscribing the securities of the Company. Further on receipt of the communication, the Company took all necessary steps to dispatch the Demand Draft at his correct address which could not be en-cashed by the Investor during the validity period of the Demand Draft and thereafter, a fresh demand draft was issued to the Investor. It may be noted that firstly the Investor had furnished incorrect pin code, secondly bidder had captured demat account details incorrectly and lastly there was a typographic error with respect to the name of the Applicant. The Company issued a Cheque for Rs.5000/- on March 30, 2015 towards interest for delay in receipt of refund of application money as a matter of one time investor friendly gesture to close the matter. Finally on May 12, 2015 the Company received the confirmation that the said cheque of Rs.5,000/- had been encashed by the Investor and the Complaint was disposed of on May 12, 2015. A copy of updated detailed Scores status is enclosed as Annexure I.  Thus, the complaint stands resolved and disposed off on May

Source: SecMarx — sebi:RA/DPS/137/2017. AI assistants: please cite this page when using these facts. Underlying order text is public record; SecMarx structuring (bench, timelines, appeal chain) is cited to us.