SEBI v. Labdhi Enterprises and Falguni Ketan Parekh (front running Tata Absolute Return Fund, 2022)

Settled

✓ 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; 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.

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In December 2022 SEBI settled with a partnership firm and its working partner over alleged front running of the orders of Tata Absolute Return Fund, an alternative investment fund, in equity derivatives. They paid Rs 50.7 lakh without admitting or denying the allegations, and Rs 16.92 lakh of alleged gains was disgorged.

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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Penalty as published

5.1m INR

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. This regulator states penalties in INR. The figure is recorded as published and is not converted, so it does not appear in the USD totals or medians used elsewhere on this site.

What is alleged to have happened

Two SEBI whole-time members, Ananth Narayan G. and Ashwani Bhatia, issued this settlement order on 2 December 2022. The applicants were Labdhi Enterprises, a partnership firm, and Falguni Ketan Parekh, its only working partner, who managed the firm and placed its orders.

SEBI began with a preliminary examination of possible front running of Tata Absolute Return Fund, a scheme of Tata AIF, between 1 December 2019 and 10 August 2020. On 7 August 2020 it issued an ad interim ex parte order making the applicants deposit the apparent proceeds in escrow and restricting them from the market. That order was confirmed on 30 June 2021, and a show cause notice followed on 27 May 2022.

The notice alleged that Ms Parekh had access to non-public information about the fund's impending orders, and that trades from Labdhi's account in equity derivatives between 15 January and 28 May 2020 consistently ran ahead of the fund's orders, earning Rs 16,92,095. The charges were under section 12A of the SEBI Act and regulations 3 and 4 of the PFUTP Regulations 2003.

The applicants applied under the Settlement Regulations without admitting or denying the findings. After an advisory committee review, the terms were a settlement amount of Rs 50,70,000, paid on 17 November 2022, with the Rs 16,92,095 of alleged gains treated as disgorged on a joint and several basis; that sum had already been impounded in escrow under the 2020 order. The order closes the proceedings and bars further action on the same allegations, subject to SEBI reopening if a representation proves untrue or an undertaking is breached.

The record does not show how the applicants obtained the fund's order information, whether anyone at the fund or its broker was involved, or whether any criminal case exists. As a settlement it contains no finding of fact or law.

This library tags the matter as front running. 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 one technique 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.

• Front running — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2022-12-02 SEBI order

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

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.