SEBI Bars Actor Arshad Warsi, Wife, Among 57 Others From Securities Market

Markets regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has banned actor Arshad Warsi, his spouse Maria Goretti and 57 other individuals from the securities market for a period of one to five years. This comes after their involvement in deceptive YouTube videos that urged investors to purchase the shares of Sadhna Broadcast.

SEBI has slapped a penalty of ₹5 lakh each on Warsi and Goretti, along with a one-year ban from the securities market, the regulatory body said.

In addition to this, the market regulator has also imposed financial penalties ranging between ₹5 lakh to ₹5 crore on 57 other parties, which includes promoters of Sadhna Broadcast (presently known as Crystal Business System Ltd).

SEBI has urged all the involved entities to return illegal profits worth over ₹58.01 crore, thereby slapping an additional 12% annual interest.

Notably, Arshad earned accumulated profits worth ₹41.70 lakh, while his wife Maria Goretti gained ₹50.35 lakh from these activities.

Gaurav Gupta, Rakesh Kumar Gupta and Manish Mishra were identified as the primary orchestrators of this scheme. The order also named a director of SBL's RTA, who served as an intermediary between Manish Mishra and the promoters.

SEBI noted that Peeyush Agarwal and Lokesh Shah enabled their accounts to be used for the fraudulent strategies of Manish Mishra and SBL’s promoters. Jatin Shah played a crucial role in manipulating the value of the share.

As per the 109-page directive, SEBI said that involved parties helped in executing manipulative trades, without trading the scrip through their personal accounts.

Sebi explained that the plan was orchestrated in two manners. Initially, connected and promoter-associated entities carried out trades among themselves to inflate the share price. This was propelled by creating an artificial market activity.

The small number of transactions had a significant impact on the share price due to low liquidity. This led to a bloated share value despite minimal trading resources.

The promotional content was propagated via various YouTube platforms including 'Moneywise', ‘The Advisor’, and ‘Profit Yatra’, which were under Manish Mishra's management.

The circulated videos showed SBL as an attractive investment and were further released to aid complement and enhance the orchestrated market activities.