According to a statement released on Sunday by his spokeswoman, businessman Anil Ambani is examining a Sebi ruling that imposes a punishment and bars him from the capital markets for five years in connection with an alleged fund diversion case.Â
He will then take the necessary action as instructed by the law. According to a statement from the spokesman, Ambani resigned from the boards of Reliance Infrastructure Ltd. and Reliance Power Ltd. in response to an interim decision issued by Sebi on February 11, 2022, regarding Reliance Home Finance Ltd.
Banned from other security markets
The individual “is in compliance with the said interim order (of February 11, 2022) for the last two and half years,” added the statement. According to the spokesperson, “Mr. Ambani is reviewing the final order dated August 22, 2024 passed by Sebi in the said matter, and will take appropriate next steps as legally advised.”
The order from August 22 banned him and 24 other people from the securities market for five years on the grounds of alleged fund diversion. Ambani was also hit with a punishment of Rs 25 crore by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), which claimed he masterminded a plot to “siphon off” money from Reliance Home Finance, a listed subsidiary of the conglomerate Reliance Group, of which he is chairman.
He and the other 24 are banned from the securities market and cannot purchase, sell, or engage in any other type of trading. Reliance Infrastructure Ltd., a company listed on the Mumbai stock exchange, claimed in a different statement that it “was not a notice or party to the proceedings before Sebi in which the order is passed.
The order against Reliance Infrastructure Ltd. contains no directives. “Mr. Ambani resigned from the Reliance Infrastructure Ltd. board of directors in accordance with the interim order issued by Sebi on February 11, 2022, in connection with the same proceedings.
Therefore, Reliance Infrastructure Ltd.’s operations and affairs are unaffected in any way by the August 22, 2024, Sebi ruling,” the statement stated. Anil Ambani’s second publicly traded firm, Reliance Power, released a statement claiming that Ambani had resigned in 2022 and that the most recent Sebi order had no impact on it.
Victim of fraudulent
In the ruling dated August 22, Sebi claimed that Reliance Home Finance, a provider of construction and housing loans, had been the victim of a “fraudulent” operation that “siphoned off” funds by passing them off as loans to consumers who were not creditworthy.
The regulator claimed that the majority of these borrowers were connected to “promoters”. Reliance Industries Ltd. was founded by Anil Ambani and his older brother Mukesh, and it was split in July 2006 from their father Dhirubhai Ambani.
While the older brother acquired the traditional oil refining and petrochemicals businesses, Anil Ambani’s Reliance Group focused on financial services, infrastructure, and telecommunications.
Anil Ambani has witnessed the bankruptcy of three of the group’s biggest companies—Reliance Communications, Reliance Capital, and Reliance Infrastructure—due to unpaid debt throughout the past few years.
Reliance Home Finance is accused by Sebi of lending more than Rs 9,000 crore to “nondescript borrowers who had no demonstrable financial ability to repay any of it”. Executives from Anil Ambani’s Reliance Group and other unlisted businesses linked to him are among the other 24 prohibited individuals.
