New Delhi. The Congress on Tuesday claimed that the consulting company set up by Madhavi Puri Buch before her appointment as the head of the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and its statutory auditor are registered at the same address. Party general secretary Jairam Ramesh also said that a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) is needed to investigate the Adani scam and the functioning of SEBI. Hindenburg Research had alleged in a report on Saturday that SEBI chairperson Buch and her husband had stakes in obscure ‘foreign funds’ used in the alleged Adani money laundering scam. SEBI chief Buch and her husband had issued a joint statement rejecting Hindenburg’s allegations outright and calling it completely baseless.
Ramesh claimed in a statement, “More questions are being raised about possible misconduct by SEBI chief Madhavi Puri Buch. Regulatory filings of a consulting company set up by her before her appointment as SEBI chief show that this company and its statutory auditor are registered at the same address.” According to him, Madhavi Buch has resigned as the director of this consulting company, but the SEBI chief’s husband has been the director of that company since 2019.
The Congress leader said, “A company and its auditor sharing the same address is generally a sign of poor corporate governance. According to the ICAI code of conduct, statutory accountants should avoid bias, conflict of interest or undue influence. Sharing the same location indicates such bias.” He alleged that the SEBI chief and her husband also misled the public by claiming that the consulting company “became inactive soon after her appointment to SEBI.”
Ramesh claimed, “This is not true. Between 2019 and 2024, the company earned a revenue of Rs 3.63 crore, most of which was earned between 2019 and 2022, when Buch was a full-time member of SEBI. After her appointment as SEBI chief in March 2022, the company earned about Rs 41.75 lakh.”
He said that there is an increasing need for a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) to investigate the Adani scam and the working style of SEBI. The Adani Group on Sunday termed the latest allegations of US research and investment company Hindenburg Research as malicious and selectively manipulating public information and said that it has no commercial relationship with the chairperson of market regulator SEBI or her husband.