After private sector experiment, finance secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey named Sebi chief

MUMBAI/NEW DELHI: Government on Thursday named finance secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey as the brand new Sebi chairman, choosing a civil servant to as soon as once more lead the market regulator after present chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch, a former ICICI Bank government, confronted controversies, together with allegations of battle of curiosity. Buch’s time period ends on Friday.
Pandey, who turns 60 in August, has been given a 3-year time period at Sebi. This marks one other occasion of a serving bureaucrat being appointed to a regulatory publish earlier than retirement. Barring Puri Buch, the opposite 10 Sebi chiefs have both been IAS officers or have come from the general public sector.

Once Pandey takes cost, three of 4 monetary regulators will probably be led by IAS officers, with pension regulator Dipak Mohanty (an ex-RBI government director) being sole exception. The 1987-batch IAS officer has had an extended stint within the finance ministry, having served as secretary within the division of funding and public asset administration (DIPAM) for 5 years.
During that interval, he was concerned with privatisation of Air India and concerned with a number of public points by public sector corporations, exposing him to inventory markets. In Jan, weeks earlier than the Budget, Pandey was moved to the income division.
The soft-spoken officer, who hails from Punjab, holds a grasp’s diploma in economics and had served as finance secretary in Odisha and was earlier in Planning Commission. He additionally holds an MBA from the University of Birmingham.
Pandey is understood to be a stickler for guidelines and has a really clear picture. Not shy to talk his thoughts, he makes his level, with out offending anybody. One of the primary duties earlier than him could be to take care of employees challenges, which got here to the fore throughout Puri Buch’s tenure, when Sebi workers held an indication on the company’s BKS headquarters, in what was seen as a revolt in opposition to new HR insurance policies. He has to revive the boldness amongst stakeholders that the Sebi chief is neutral.