Senior IAS officer Ajay Tyagi appointed as SEBI Chairman

The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) has appointed senior bureaucrat Ajay Tyagi (58) as the new chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
Mr. Tyagi will have tenure of 5 years or till the age of 65 years or until further orders. He will succeed UK Sinha whose term ends on March 1, 2017. His name was recommended by the search-cum-selection panel headed by the cabinet secretary along with some other candidates.

About Ajay Tyagi

• Ajay Tyagi is 1984 batch IAS (Indian Administrative Services) officer of Himachal Pradesh cadre.
• Prior to this appointment, he was Additional secretary (investment) in the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, handling the capital market division.
• He had served as the chairman of the finance ministry-appointed panel which monitored the merger of the Forward Markets Commission (FMC) with the SEBI.
• He had represented India at the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an intergovernmental body set up to combat money laundering, terror financing and other related threats.
• Currently he is also representing India at the Financial Stability Board (FSB), an international body to monitor global financial systems. He also had led the initiatives on corporate bonds markets.

About Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI)

• SEBI is the statutory regulator for the securities market in India established in 1988. It was given statutory powers through the SEBI Act, 1992.
• Mandate: Protect the interests of investors in securities, promote the development of securities market and to regulate the securities market.
• SEBI has is responsive to needs of three groups, which constitute the market, issuers of securities, investors and market intermediaries.
• It has three functions: quasi-legislative (drafts regulations in its legislative capacity), quasi-judicial (passes rulings and orders in its judicial capacity) and quasi-executive (conducts investigation and enforcement action in its executive function).
• Headquarters: Mumbai, Maharashtra.

Month: Current Affairs - February, 2017