The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has decided to practice what it preaches in the area of corporate governance and board structure.
To start with, the independent board members will conduct a performance audit of the regulatory body. The capital market regulator is also in favour of inducting a woman board member – just like the norm for listed companies.
“In the recent board meeting, it was decided that independent board members will evaluate SEBI’s performance,” said SEBI Chairman U.K. Sinha while addressing the annual capital market summit by Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI). “The whole-time members will only cooperate and offer assistance while doing it,” he added.
Walk the talk The SEBI chairman, who is due to retire next year in February, said that the regulator would not insist that the market comply with something that the watchdog itself cannot do and that hence, it would evaluate its own corporate governance standards.
Currently, there are four part-time members on the SEBI board along with the chairman and the two whole-time members.
A position of a whole-time member is lying vacant ever since Prashant Saran retired in June.
According to Mr. Sinha, the independent members of SEBI’s board will meet separately to discuss issues related to such a performance audit of the regulator. He, however, did not elaborate on a time-line for such meetings.
Meanwhile, SEBI has also asked the finance ministry to appoint a woman member to the board of the regulatory body.
On a different note, the SEBI chairman said that the regulator is working on allowing new participants and products in the commodity derivatives segment.
Last month, the Securities and Exchange Board of India allowed commodity exchanges to launch option contracts and soon such contracts will be available for trading in two commodities - one each in the agriculture and the non-agriculture space.
