Part 1- Fraud By Amrapali Aadya Trading and investment Private Limited
If you are a person who invest his hard earned money into bourses and pickup shares of some bluechip company and think that after few years you would get some handsome return then there is no surety of that. In fact even if your scrip performs well then also there can a possibility that you would lose all your hard earned money that was invested into that shares. It sounds quite absurd but it is true as there is quite a possibility that your broker, with whom you have your trading and DMAT account, does some fraud and ultimately default on the Exchange and your whole money or shares would go into ashes in a jiffy.
Exactly this has happened to Ms. Santosh Rani, Abha Sharma and thousands of other investors Delhi based broker called Amrapali Aadya Trading and Investment Private limited, who have done financial fraud by selling investors equity without their consent and misappropriated the amount in the name of his employee and channelized it to some other venture. When SEBI sniffed some wrong doing by the broker, then they have barred MD Sanjeeva Kumar Sinha of Amrapali Aadya and other directors from securities market in August 2017. Immediately NSE has also suspended the broker from trading activity as preliminary finding clearly suggested that broker has pledged stocks of clients to the tune of around Rs. 56 crore with Globe Capital and Globe Fincap. But the main question here remained unanswered that what should an investor, like Santosh Rani or Abha Sharma do in this case to get their shares or funds back? Khabar India has decided to fight for the innocent investors who were defrauded by Amrapali Aadya and didn’t know where to go and what to do.
NSE Seems Indifferent Towards Investors Interests
But If we go by the response of Spokesman of National Stock Exchange (NSE), India’s biggest stock exchange, believe us, the battle is quite cumbersome for you as an innocent investors as NSE doesn’t have any responsibility towards the investors and they would merely wash their hand just by barring the defaulting broker. “What NSE can do as far as Shares and Funds of investors are concerned? We are responsible towards the action of broker and as soon as we found that Broker (Amrapali Aadya) is involved in some wrongdoing we have suspended it,” informed NSE Spokesman. “If investors wants their shares or money back then they should go court (or any other forum) and it will instruct the broker to repay the money of investors but how NSE would be responsible for investors,” Spokesman added.
Legal Experts Think Otherwise
This is quite shocking to us as legally broker is the member of the stock exchange. When we consulted some legal lawyers then they have informed us that broker being the member of stock exchange, stock exchange is fully responsible for the wrong doing of its member and if investors are duped by some broker then, exchange would make good their loss out of investors protection fund (IPF) as happened in many past cases, where brokers have defaulted.
When we take the case with finance ministry officials then they also seemed in line with the financial expert. “SEBI itself is a quasi judicial authority and is quite capable in handling cases of broker’s default so investors didn’t have to worry about their Shares and Money and should lodge complaint with SEBI,” informed a top finance ministry official. “Also NSE can’t shrug off its shoulders with its responsibility towards investors and they have their own investors grievance mechanism too, so investors should file complaint with them also. NSE is bound to take action,” official added.
Sold securities without Clients’ conent
Importantly many investors of Amrapali Aadya from across the country have filed complaint with SEBI and NSE (copy of complaints is there with khabar india) but till now no update has been received by them from any corner. In the mean time various offices of Amrapali Aadya have already been shut down by the broker across the country, giving increasing mental stress to innocent investors.
It came to our knowledge that Broker was also lured investors to some “fixed return” in lieu of shares kept with the “pool account” and then sold these securities without investor’s consent. There are around 2296 such investors. As per SEBI order this is clear violation of SEBI rule. “Clause 15 of Rights and Obligations document for Stock Broker, Sub-brokers and Clients as prescribed by SEBI vide its circular dated August 22, 2011 stipulates that securities of the clients cannot be used for itself. Admittedly since the securities of the clients have been used by AATIPL, I am prima facie of the view that AATIPL has violated this provision,” SEBI order said.
Going by the state of affair, it is of prime importance on the part of SEBI and NSE that they should take some concrete steps in Amrapali Aadya’s case and arrange for returning back stocks and funds of thousands innocent investors, so that trust of investors on markets would be reinstated. Also If any investors have any complaint against Aamprapali Aadya then they can write to us at khabarindia.in@gmail.com. We will surely take up the matter.
