The Forward Markets Commission (FMC), the regulator for the commodity futures market, has asked the National Multi-Commodity Exchange Ltd (NMCE) to rework its proposal to appoint Sudip Bandyopadhyay, director and CEO of Reliance Money (R-Money), on the board of the commodities exchange.
Bandyopadhyay was seeking to join the NMCE board as an alternate director.
R-Money, a unit of financial services company Reliance Capital Ltd belonging to the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), plans to acquire a 26% stake in Ahmedabad-based NMCE.
The FMC has sought a reworking of the proposal since there is no provision for alternate directors on the boards of commodity exchanges. Confirming the FMC move, FMC chairman BC Khatua told FE: ?There is no provision in the law to appoint a person as an alternate director on the board of the exchange. Hence, we have asked them to rework the proposal.?
There are 12 directors on the NMCE board and key directors include NK Choubey, UKS Chauhan, managing director Kailash Gupta, Anupam Mishra and Rajnikant Patel, who was until recently managing director & CEO of the Bombay Stock Exchange.
When contacted, Bandyopadhyay said: ?I have no knowledge of this development.? NMCE managing director Kailash Gupta declined to comment on the matter. It remains to be seen how R-Money reworks the proposal and whether the 12-member board is expanded further to accommodate Bandyopadhyay.
It may be recalled that R-Money had said it would buy fresh equity of the exchange and two nominees of the company would be inducted on the board of the commodities bourse. NMCE is the oldest of the country?s three national commodity derivatives exchanges. The exchange has a very good presence in the black pepper, rubber and raw jute futures trading.