E-voting mandated by SEBI

Securities & Exchange board of India (SEBI) has mandated listed companies to use electronic voting for seeking shareholder approvals. This will enable greater shareholder participation in decision-making. The Securities & Exchange board of India (SEBI) diktat will be applicable to the top 500 companies by market capitalisation on the NSE and the BSE. SEBI has also made changes to offer-for-sale (OFS) through stock exchanges. Promoters may offload stake within the cooling-off period of plus/minus 12 weeks only through OFS or institutional placement programme (IPP) with a two-week gap between two such stake sales, said SEBI. This is also applicable to promoters who have already shed stake through OFS or IPP. Time for modifying or cancelling bids has been increased from 30 to 60 minutes prior to close of bidding session. Indicative price will be shown during the last 60 minutes of the bidding session. This is irrespective of book-building, said SEBI.