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The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), making fresh efforts to locate investors eligible for refunds from the Sahara group, has encouraged bondholders to submit their claims along with the proof of their investments.
The capital market regulator had earlier made two attempts in August-September 2014, and December 2014-January 2015, to refund money collected from bond holders of Sahara India Real Estate Corp (SIRECL) and Sahara Housing Investment Corp Ltd (SHICL), in line with orders of the Supreme Court.
No deadline has so far been fixed for the latest attempt.
Of the money the Sahara firms have to deposit with Sebi for further refund to investors, they have deposited over Rs 12,000 crore. A spokesperson for the Sahara group claimed the firms had already directly refunded around Rs 23,000 crore (nearly 95 per cent) to the investors. The group also claims to have given documentary proofs of 75 per cent of these direct refunds to Sebi, asking them to verify. The firms had originally raised Rs 25,780 crore from about 30 million investors.
Last year, in its first attempt at such a recovery, Sebi had received close to 5,000 refund claims. It has now called for investors holding Real Estate, Abode and Nirmaan Bonds of SIRECL, as also those holding Multiple, Income and Housing Bonds of SHICL, to file their applications along with the necessary documentary proof for the refund.
However, according to a PTI report, Sahara claims Sebi has been able to repay only Rs 2 crore after three rounds of media advertisements across 50-60 publications that led to total demands for about Rs 20 crore; most investors have already got their money back.
Complications in the refund procedure have also arisen due to incomplete addresses and missing bank accounts, with both Sebi and Sahara playing the blame-game as to who is responsible for incompetency in data collection. The new refund form issued by Sebi, however seeks to address this issue.
PTI also reported that Sebi had said earlier discrepancies in documents given by applicants had been brought to notice of applicants, and replies were awaited.
