SEBI v. Shivshankar Joshi and Geetaben Joshi (funded preferential allotment, Esaar India, 2022)
Judgment entered
Checked against the primary document on October 9, 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; a later sample of 50 of the SEBI records added on 9 October agreed on every field for 46. 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.
In June 2022 a SEBI adjudicating officer fined two preferential allottees in Esaar India Limited, Shivshankar Joshi and Geetaben Joshi, Rs 10,00,000 each for taking part in a funded subscription. The order finds that an outside finance company supplied part of the money and later received a larger sum back from the issue proceeds.
The record
| Agency | SEBI (India) |
|---|---|
| Date filed | 2022-06-30 |
| Date resolved | 2022-06-30 |
| Court | SEBI adjudicating officer |
| Status | judgment |
| Asset class | equities |
| Instruments | Esaar (India) Limited shares (2011 preferential allotment) |
| Venue | BSE |
| Criminal parallel | No |
| Defendants | Shivshankar Joshi ; Geetaben Joshi |
| Techniques |
What was ordered
- Civil penalty
- —
- Disgorgement
- —
- Prejudgment interest
- —
- Total relief
- —
- Alleged gain
- —
- Penalty as published
- 2m INR
What is alleged to have happened
The order of 30 June 2022 is one of several arising from SEBI's examination of the May 2011 preferential allotment of 31,77,000 shares by Esaar (India) Limited to 44 non-promoter entities, raising about Rs 15.89 crore. The shares were listed on BSE in August 2011 and many allottees later sold to entities connected to the company.
SEBI alleged that the Joshis were allotted 60,000 shares and paid Rs 15,00,000 each, but that Rs 30,00,000 of that money came into Mr Joshi's account from Surface Finance Private Ltd, whose signatories and registered email were linked to a former Esaar director. Esaar then paid Rs 1.52 crore of the issue proceeds to Surface Finance. SEBI said this showed the allotment was partly funded by money from the company's own circle, contrary to section 12A of the SEBI Act and Regulations 3(b) to (d) and 4(1) of the PFUTP Regulations.
The Joshis did not answer SEBI's queries about the Rs 30,00,000 or their dealings with Surface Finance. The adjudicating officer found that the funding arrangement amounted to a false representation through the preferential allotment, with the potential to mislead investors who traded in the shares.
The penalty is Rs 10,00,000 each under section 15HA of the SEBI Act, Rs 20,00,000 in total, payable within 45 days. The order states that no gain or investor loss was quantified and that no earlier default was on record.
The record does not show whether the penalties were paid or appealed, how the Joshis were connected to Surface Finance beyond the transfers, or the full set of dispositions of the other allottees.
This library tags the matter as no specific technique, because the finding is a funded preferential allotment rather than one of the library's trading methods. 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.
Timeline
- 2022-06-30 SEBI adjudication order (30 June 2022)
Primary documents
Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.