NSE case: Delhi Court dismisses bail petition of Anand Subramanian

The court recently had kept the order reserved after hearing the arguments of both sides. Earlier, Advocate Arshdeep Singh Khurana, who appeared for Subramanian, argued that as far as the allegations contained in the FIR are concerned, the applicant has been wrongly implicated in the case, since he is not connected in any manner with the allegations so levelled. No offence is made out even from a reading of the FIR.

New Delhi:Special CBI court of Delhi on Thursday dismissed the bail petition of Anand Subramanian in connection with the NSE co-location case. Subramanian, former Group Operating Officer and ex-advisor to former MD of National Stock Exchange (NSE), was the first person arrested by the CBI in the case last month. Special CBI Judge Sanjeev Aggarwal refused to grant the bail to Subramanian.

The court recently had kept the order reserved after hearing the arguments of both sides. Earlier, Advocate Arshdeep Singh Khurana, who appeared for Subramanian, argued that as far as the allegations contained in the FIR are concerned, the applicant has been wrongly implicated in the case, since he is not connected in any manner with the allegations so levelled. No offence is made out even from a reading of the FIR.

"In fact, the FIR pertains to the applicant's alleged role in the unfair access to Co-location facilities to one Sanjay Gupta and his company OPG Security Pvt Ltd. It has been stated that Sanjay Gupta with help from unknown persons, managed the data centre staff of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) who passed on information regarding switching on time of NSE exchange servers, which gave him an unfair advantage," submitted Singh.

Advocates Vishnu Mohan and Aakashi Lodha also appeared for Arvind Subramanian in the case. The CBI counsel while opposing the bail plea submitted that 832 GB of data was recovered. "We recovered it from the archive. We have written to Microsoft to give us the complete data. He was not cooperating with us. He even deleted material and certain emails. Anand is very influential and there is every possibility that he might flee," said the CBI lawyer.

CBI further submitted that this person was known to Chitra Ramkrishna prior to joining the NSE. "There are several emails of this person influencing Chitra. The emails that have been extracted suggests that sensitive information has been leaked," it said. Earlier, the CBI submitted that they are seriously looking at all the aspects of the investigation and a special team of 30 officials consisting of senior officials has been formed to probe the case.

"We are also probing the role of SEBI officials in the matter. We have also recently questioned Ravi Narain, former MD of NSE," the CBI said. The court recently sent former managing director and chief executive officer of National Stock Exchange (NSE) Chitra Ramkrishna in connection with the NSE co-location case in Judicial remand.

The CBI, while producing Chitra Ramkrishna after arrest, also apprised the court that Chitra did not recognize Anand Subramanian in the first meeting. According to the CBI investigation, group operating officer Anand Subramanian's appointment was influenced by NSE chairman and MD Chitra Ramakrishnan. The CBI is probing the alleged improper dissemination of information from the computer servers of the market exchanges to the stockbrokers.

Earlier, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) penalized the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and its former CEOs Chitra Ramakrishna and Ravi Narayan and two other officials for lapses in recruitment at the senior level. Ravi Narain was the MD and CEO of the National Stock Exchange from April 1994 till March 2013, while Chitra Ramkrishna was MD and CEO of the NSE from April 2013 to December 2016.

The market regulator observed that the NSE and its top executives violated securities contract norms relating to the appointment of Anand Subramaniam as group operating officer and advisor to the managing director.

(ANI)