The New York-based short seller firm Hindenburg Research said that Sebi chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch has maintained complete silence for weeks on all of the emerging issues, in reaction to the recent allegations put forth against her by the Congress.
Hinderburg in a reaction on X (formerly Twitter) said, "New allegations have emerged that the private consulting entity, 99% owned by SEBI chairperson Madhabi Buch, accepted payments from multiple listed companies regulated by SEBI during her time as a SEBI member."
The companies, according to the short seller, include Mahindra & Mahindra, ICICI Bank, Dr. Reddy's and Pidilite. These allegations apply to Buch's consulting entity with no details available thus far on Buch's Singapore-based consulting entity, it added.
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The development comes after Congress in a shocking set of revelations alleged that Buch and her husband earned crores of rupees from 6 listed companies mentioned above.
Contrary to Buch's claim that the advisory company owned by her became dormant when she took office as Sebi's chair, Congress said that Agora Private Limited continued to provide services and generated revenue of Rs 2.95 crore between 2016 and 2024.
The opposition party reportedly stated that Agora's clients included Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M), Dr Reddy's, Pidilite, ICICI, Sembcorp, Visu Leasing and Finance.
The Congress alleged that in addition to the Rs 2.95 cr received by 'Agora Advisory Private Limited' through its consultancy/advisory, Madhabi Buch's husband, Dhaval Buch received Rs 4.78 cr as income in a personal capacity from M&M.
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Recently, Hindenburg Research made allegations against the Sebi chief by accusing her of a conflict of interest. It stated that both Buch and her husband had stakes in "both the obscure entities used in the Adani money siphoning scandal".
After that, Madhabi Puri Buch and her husband Dhaval Buch in a joint statement released to the media denied the baseless claims of the Hindenburg report.
"We have no hesitation in disclosing any financial documents, including those that relate to the period when we were strictly private citizens, to any and every authority that may seek them. Further, in the interest of complete transparency, we would be issuing a detailed statement in due course," the joint statement said when the allegations initilaly came out.
