NSE Co-Location case: Delhi court notice to CBI on Subramanian's bail plea

A Special Court of Delhi has issued notice to the Central Bureau Investigation (CBI) on the fresh bail petition of Anand Subramanian in the NSE Co-Location case. On March 24, the same court dismissed Anand Subramanian's first bail petition in the matter.

Subramanian, former Group Operating Officer and ex-advisor to former MD of National Stock Exchange (NSE), was the first person arrested by CBI in the NSE Co-Location case in February this month.

The Special CBI Judge Sanjeev Aggarwal on Wednesday dated April 13, 2022, sought a response from the CBI on the second bail plea of Anand and listed the matter for April 26, 2022, for arguments.

While dismissing his first bail plea, the Court had said that the prosecution at this stage of investigation is stated to be working on disjoint scattered dots, from which it has to conjure a final picture in the shape of a charge sheet.

The investigations which are at the initial stage will crystalize into concrete form only after filing the charge sheet.

"Therefore, considering the grave and serious allegations against the present accused, as discussed above, no ground for his bail is made out at this stage. The application stands dismissed," said the Court while dismissing his first bail plea.

Earlier, Advocate Arshdeep Singh Khurana appeared for Arvind Subramanian and argued that the allegations contained in the FIR are concerned, the applicant has been wrongly implicated in the case, since he is not connected in any manner with the allegations so levelled. No offence is made out even from a reading of the FIR, he pointed out.

In fact, the FIR pertains to the applicant's alleged role in the unfair access to Co-location facilities to one Sanjay Gupta and his company OPG Security Pvt Ltd. It has been stated that Sanjay Gupta with help from unknown persons, managed the data centre staff of the National Stock Exchange who passed on information regarding switching on time of NSE exchange servers, which gave him an unfair advantage, submitted Advocate Arshdeep Singh. Advocates Vishnu Mohan and Aakashi Lodha also appeared for Arvind Subramanian in the case.

CBI counsel, while opposing the bail plea, submitted that 832 GB of data was recovered. "We recovered it from the archive. We have written to Microsoft to give us the complete data. He was not cooperating with us. Even, the deleted material and certain emails. Anand is very influential and there is every possibility that he might flee," said the CBI lawyer.

The CBI further submitted that this person was known to Chitra prior to joining the NSE. "There are several emails of this person influencing Chitra. The emails that have been extracted suggest that sensitive information has been leaked," the agency added.

Earlier, CBI submitted that it is seriously looking at all the aspects of the investigation and a special team of 30 officials consisting of senior officials to probe the case. "We are also probing the role of SEBI officials in the matter. We have also recently questioned Ravi Narain, former MD of NSE."

CBI while producing Chitra Ramkrishna after arresting also apprised the court that Chitra Ramakrishna did not recognise Anand Subramanian in the first meeting.

According to the CBI investigation, group operating Officer Anand Subramanian's appointment was influenced by NSE chairman and MD Chitra Ramakrishnan.

The CBI is probing the alleged improper dissemination of information from the computer servers of the market exchanges to the stockbrokers.

Earlier, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) penalized the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and its former CEOs Chitra Ramakrishna and Ravi Narayan and two other officials for lapses in recruitment at the senior level.

Ravi Narain was the MD and CEO of the National Stock Exchange from April 1994 till March 2013, while Chitra Ramkrishna was the MD and CEO of the NSE from April 2013 to December 2016.

The market regulator observed that the NSE and its top executives violated securities contract norms relating to the appointment of Anand Subramaniam as group operating officer and advisor to the managing director.