SC to constitute a bench for hearing on SEBI-Sahara refund case

The Supreme Court on Friday said that it would soon constitute a bench, which was earlier being led by former Chief Justice T S Thakur, for hearing the SEBI-Sahara refund case.

“We will set up a bench by next week,” a bench comprising Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justices N V Ramana and D Y Chandrachud said.

The observation came when senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the Sahara Group and its chief Subrata Roy, raised the issue.

A three-judge bench, comprising the then CJI and Justices Ranjan Gogoi and A K Sikri, had asked Roy on November 28 last year to deposit Rs 600 crore more by February 6 this year in the SEBI-Sahara refund account to remain out of jail and had cautioned him that in case of failure, he would have to return to prison.

CJI Thakur demitted office on January 3. The bench, initially, had asked Roy to deposit Rs 1,000 crore with market regulator SEBI in two months or it will appoint a receiver, but later reduced the money to be deposited to Rs 600 crore till February 6, 2017.

Market regulator SEBI had earlier said that Sahara Group was liable to pay Rs 37,000 crore with interest to SEBI, of which the principal amount payable was Rs 24,000 crore.

Sahara has already paid Rs 10,918 crore out of Rs 24,029 crore raised from investors, SEBI had said.

The court has been extending the parole of Roy and two directors—Ashok Roy Choudhary and Ravi Shankar Dubey—on payment of certain amount in the SEBI-Sahara refund account.