Government on Friday assured the Parliament that "wrong doers" in the multi-crore stock scam would be "identified and punished".
Presenting the voluminous action taken report on JPC recommendations in the Lok Sabha, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh also said all pending actions would be completed early.
Indicating that the government has already initiated action on important recommendations about corporatisation and demutualisation of stock exchanges, he said that Securities Contracts Regulation Act was being amended for this purpose.
Apart from taking several measures to enhance the efficiency and safety of the markets to ensure investor protection, Singh said, broker members have been disallowed to become office bearers of stock exchanges.
Sebi has set up a separate division for inspection of stock exchanges and is taking follow up action on the status of compliance of recommendations, he said, adding the Government has fulfilled its commitment to restructure the beleaguered Unit Trust of India.
Sebi has also been given more teeth to take action against the securities market defaulters, initiate action against the brokers and corporates involved in insider trading and manipulation of various scrips, he said.
The action taken report has been tabled in Parliament as promised within six months of the submission of the JPC report that made 276 important recommendations.
The JPC had observed that systemic weaknesses and abuse of the system by various individuals had led to the scam.
Listing out the measures taken by Sebi to check manipulations in the market, the action taken report said Sebi took stringent action against Big Bull Ketan Parekh, who was described as a key player in the scam by JPC.
Parekh is said to have received large sums of money from the banks as well as from the corporate bodies during the period when Sensex was falling sharply in early 2001.
This led the committee to believe that there was a nexus between Ketal Parekh, banks and the corporate houses, the ATR said, adding Sebi has debarred several broking companies connected with Parikh, cancelled registration of stock broker
Triumph International Finance India and suspended registration of Credit Suisse First Boston for two years.
ATR said prosecution has also been filed against 17 persons/entities including Ketan Parekh, Kartik Parekh and Kritikumar N Parekh.
Regarding action against Global Trust Bank promoters, ATR said orders were issued by Sebi against promoter entities not to buy, sell or transfer, pledge or dispose of or deal with shares of Global Trust Bank directly or indirectly.
As regards effective coordination between the regulatory and investigative agencies, ATR said Enforcement Directorate had informed that a mechanism was put in place through the regional economic intelligence coordination committee.
