Sebi today imposed a total penalty of Rs 7.70 lakh on five companies for failure to obtain registration with regulator's online system for investors complaints as well as not redressing pending grievances against them.
Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has disposed of the proceedings against Baba Arts Ltd and Unimers India as well as their respective directors after the companies resolved all the investor complaints pending against them.
The market regulator through separate orders has imposed a penalty of Rs 2 lakh on JK Leatherite, Rs 1.50 lakh each on -- Superior Finlease, Majestic Overseas, Lakshya Securities & Credit Holding -- and a fine of Rs 1.20 lakh on Intecon India.
According to Sebi orders, the companies had "neither obtained SCORES authentication nor resolved the pending investor grievances.
In the cases against Unimers and Baba Arts, the regulator in similar-worded orderd noted that the investor complaints as "referred to in the show cause notices have been disposed of and are no longer pending".
Accordingly Sebi disposed of the SCNs against them, while asking them to "take utmost care and be vigilant in future, in respect of redressal of investor grievances".
As per Sebi norms all listed companies are required to get SCORES authentication failing which they would have to face enforcement action.
SCORES which was launched by Sebi in June 2011 provides a centralised database of all complaints, online movement of complaints to the concerned listed companies, online upload of Action Taken Reports (ATRs) by the concerned companies.
It also helps investors view, track and follow up the actions taken on their grievance.
The online redressal system has significantly helped reduce the processing time of complaints.
