Mumbai: Fraud-hit CG Power and Industrial Solutions said on Wednesday that the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has debarred its ousted Chairman Gautam Thapar from accessing the capital market for several alleged irregularities, including diversion of money.
The market regulator passed an ad-interim ex-parte order which restrains Thapar from accessing securities market and prohibits him from buying, selling or otherwise dealing in securities in any manner whatsoever, directly or indirectly, till further orders.
"Further, the order requires appointment by the BSE Limited of an independent auditor or audit firm for conducting a detailed forensic audit of the books of accounts of the company from 2015-16 onwards till date," the company said in a statement.
The SEBI order comes nearly a month after the CG Power board said the company had been hit by an accounting scandal and liabilities of the group were understated by over Rs 1,600 crore for 2017-18.
Thapar was sacked by the board of directors on August 29. A day later, the troubled company also removed V R Venkatesh as the Chief Financial Officer for irregularities and unauthorised transactions.
After CG Power's disclosure of significant accounting irregularities, SEBI met company officials and studied the preliminary investigation report. SEBI's examination of the report showed several irregularities and fraudulent transactions being carried out by key officials, including Thapar.
"Funds diverted from CG Power were fraudulently transferred to its promoter company Avantha Holdings and entities related or connected with the company, Avantha International, Acton, Ballarpur International, Mirabelle and Solaris without the knowledge of the company and without any approval from its board," said SEBI.
"The transactions were purportedly carried out by certain company personnel (both current and past) including certain non-executive directors.
The transactions are prima facie designed to divert/siphon off money from the listed company which rightfully belongs to its shareholders," said SEBI in the order.
"Some of the outgoing fund transfers do not appear to be supported by any comprehensible underlying transactions raising doubts on the bona fides and leaving gaps between various transactions," wrote SEBI's Whole-time Member G Mahalingam in his order.
