{"id":62153,"date":"2025-12-19T18:13:39","date_gmt":"2025-12-19T12:43:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=62153"},"modified":"2025-12-19T18:14:47","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T12:44:47","slug":"securities-markets-code-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/19-12-2025\/securities-markets-code-bill","title":{"rendered":"Introduction of Securities Markets Code Bill 2025 in Lok Sabha"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/ Governance; GS3\/ Economy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Union Finance Minister introduced the Securities Markets Code Bill 2025 in the Lok Sabha.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>About<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The Bill proposes to consolidate the<\/strong>;\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Securities Contracts (Regulation) Act, 1956,\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) Act, 1992, and\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The Depositories Act, 1996.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Key Provisions<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Reforms in SEBI\u2019s Composition: <\/strong>The strength of the SEBI Board is proposed to be increased from <strong>9 to 15 members, <\/strong>including the Chairperson. The reconstituted Board will include;\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Chairperson.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Two officials appointed by the Central Government.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>One ex-officio member from the Reserve Bank of India.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Eleven other members, of whom <strong>at least five will be whole-time<\/strong> members. Currently there are three full-time members.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Members of the SEBI Board<\/strong> are mandated to disclose any direct or indirect interests before participating in decision-making.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Decriminalisation and Enforcement Framework:<\/strong> The Bill also proposed to decriminalise violations of \u201cminor, procedural and technical nature\u201d into civil penalties to \u201cfacilitate the ease of doing business and to reduce the compliance burden.\u201d\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Bill would bring \u201cunlawful gains or losses\u201d under civil penalties and limit punishments only to cases such as insider trading or trading while in possession of material or non-public information.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Limitation on Inspections:<\/strong> In the case of contravention of any rules or provisions of the code, no inspection can be done if <strong>eight years<\/strong> had passed from the date of contravention.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Significance of the Bill<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>It endeavours to build a<strong> principle-based legislative framework <\/strong>to reduce the compliance burden, improve regulatory governance, and enhance the dynamism of technology-driven securities markets.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The Bill aims to <strong>strengthen investor protection<\/strong> and improve the ease of doing business in the country\u2019s financial markets.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>By consolidating laws and rationalising penalties, it supports India\u2019s objective of becoming a globally competitive financial market.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Concerns of the Bill<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Concentration of Powers in SEBI: <\/strong>The Bill vests legislative (rule-making), executive (enforcement), investigative, and adjudicatory powers in SEBI.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Such concentration is seen as violating the principle of separation of powers, which seeks to prevent misuse of authority and ensure institutional checks and balances.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Delegation of Legislative Functions: <\/strong>Several core policy matters, such as the scope of regulation, registration requirements, penalties, exemptions, and even the<strong> definition of \u201csecurities\u201d<\/strong>, are left to subordinate legislation (rules and regulations).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Democratic Accountability: <\/strong>By granting broad discretion to the executive and the regulator, Parliament\u2019s role is reduced to that of an enabling body, rather than a substantive law-making authority.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Coercive Enforcement Powers: <\/strong>Wide coercive powers such as search, seizure, attachment of property, freezing of bank accounts, and ex-parte interim orders, lacking adequate safeguards.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Way Ahead<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Ensure separation of investigative, enforcement, and adjudicatory functions within SEBI to prevent institutional bias.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Strengthen parliamentary oversight and accountability through regular reporting.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Adopt a proportional, risk-based regulatory approach, limiting criminal sanctions to serious market abuse.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsonair.gov.in\/fm-nirmala-sitharaman-introduces-securities-markets-code-bill-2025-in-lok-sabha\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>AIR<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Context<\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">The Union Finance Minister introduced the Securities Markets Code Bill 2025 in the Lok Sabha.<\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong>About<\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">The Bill proposes to consolidate the;<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Securities Contracts (Regulation) Act, 1956,\u00a0<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) Act, 1992, and\u00a0<\/li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/19-12-2025\/securities-markets-code-bill\" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62153"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62157,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62153\/revisions\/62157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}