SEBI v. Hanif Shekh and others (price and volume manipulation in five scrips, Mauria Udyog and others, 2026)

Judgment entered

✓ Checked against the primary document on October 8, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, in a single reading of the order; an independent second reading of 60 SEBI records agreed on every field for 56, the four misses being penalty amounts. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

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A June 2026 SEBI final order found that Hanif Shekh and 225 other entities took part in a scheme to inflate the price and volume of five thinly traded scrips between 2017 and 2020 through connected-party trades and bulk buy recommendations, then sold into the rise. It restrains 223 noticees for four to seven years, orders disgorgement and imposes tiered penalties.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

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Disgorgement

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Prejudgment interest

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Total relief

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Alleged gain

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A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

The final order of 30 June 2026 was made by a SEBI whole-time member and runs to 394 pages. It follows an interim order and show-cause notice of 19 June 2023 against Hanif Shekh and 225 other entities. The scrips are Mauria Udyog Ltd., 7NR Retail Ltd., Darjeeling Ropeway Company Ltd. and GBL Industries Ltd., listed on the BSE, and Vishal Fabrics Ltd., listed on the BSE and NSE. The noticees include family members of Mr Shekh, companies and promoters, brokers and many individuals. Twelve are named in this record and 214 others are not.

SEBI's case was that the five scrips had little liquidity and no news or operating improvement, yet saw abnormal price and volume rises between 2017 and 2020. In a first phase, groups of connected entities that the order calls price-volume influencers traded among themselves to create artificial volume and price. In a second phase, Mr Shekh circulated buy recommendations by bulk SMS and website advertisements while another set of entities kept volumes up. In the last phase, entities tied to the companies' promoters or to Mr Shekh sold into the inflated prices. SEBI put the gains at about Rs 143.79 crore, said to have been passed through layers of conduit entities back to promoters and to entities controlled by Mr Shekh.

The order, after dealing with many procedural objections including delay, lack of urgency and the 'kingpin' label, finds the scheme established in each of the five scrips and assigns each noticee a role and a share of liability. It describes the fund flows as designed to hide the real beneficiaries, and treats the scheme's scale as an aggravating factor. Proceedings against three noticees were closed because their roles were not established.

The directions restrain the noticees for four to seven years, with seven years and a Rs 10 crore penalty for the lead noticee, six years and Rs 2 crore each for five others, five years and Rs 1 crore for a further group, four years and Rs 50 lakh for 23, and four years and Rs 5 lakh for the rest, adjusted for time already served under the interim order. Noticees listed in an annexure must disgorge their unlawful gains with 12 per cent simple interest from 21 October 2020, with liability passing to the legal representatives of two noticees who had died. The tiers are summarised here rather than totalled because the order's own grouping does not give one figure.

The record does not show appeals to the Securities Appellate Tribunal, payments, or investor losses. It describes no criminal case. SEBI imposes penalties and sanctions under the SEBI Act and does not convict.

This library tags the matter as matched orders and pump and dump. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's.

For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above. This page deliberately summarises the structured record rather than reproducing the order.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with 3 techniques in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Matched orders — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.
• Pump and dump — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.
• Price manipulation — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2026-06-30 SEBI final order with restraints, disgorgement and penalties

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• SEBI order
• SEBI order (PDF)

The linked release is published by the issuing regulator under its own terms. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added October 8, 2026. submit a correction.