Ex-NSE MD & CEO Chitra Ramkrishna sent to 14 days judicial custody

A Delhi Court on Monday sent former former managing director and chief executive officer of National Stock Exchange (NSE), Chitra Ramkrishna to 14 days judicial custody, in NSE co-location case. The court had not permitted home-cooked food requests for Ramkrishna, and had however allowed Ramakrishna to carry her medicines, spectacles and a prayer book.

The CBI arrested Ramkrishna on March 06, after her anticipatory bail application was dismissed. After arresting Ramkrishna, the CBI had stated that she was evasive and had continuously misguided the investigation officer and gave wrong statements. The CBI said her custodial interrogation was needed to unearth the criminal conspiracy and the role of other NSE officials and brokers in the company.

The court had then ordered for Ramkrishna's interrogation to be conducted under the CCTV camera surveillance and allowed her lawyers to meet her every evening. The court further said that she will be medically examined 24 hours.

The CBI counsel told the court that when Ramkrishna was confronted with co-accused Anand Subramanian, she refused to recognise him. The CBI told the court that Ramkrishna needs to be confronted with over 3,000 emails and other forms of communication.

On May 28, 2018, the CBI had registered a case of criminal conspiracy, attempt to give and receive bribes, misuse of official position and destroying evidence against the owner and promoter of a New Delhi-based private company, unknown officials of the SEBI and the NSE, Mumbai and other unknown persons.

According to the CBI, it was alleged that the owner and promoter of the said private company abused the server architecture of the NSE in conspiracy with unknown officials of the NSE. It was also alleged that unknown officials of the NSE, Mumbai, had provided unfair access to the said company using the co-location facility during the period 2010-2014 that enabled it to log in first to the exchange server of the stock exchange, helping it get the data before any other broker in the market.

Last month, SEBI had slapped a fine on Ramkrishna after finding that she was allegedly taking guidance from a yogi in various matters related to the exchange.

What is co-location?

Co-location is a set up wherein the broker's computer is located in the same area as the server of the Stock Exchange. This particular set up of server gives speed advantage to the brokers availing the co-location facility in comparison to other brokers. Till 2014, information was disseminated by exchange server to the brokers attached with co-location facility through TBT based system architecture. In this architecture, data was disseminated in a sequential manner whereby stock brokers who connected to server with lesser load would gain an unfair advantage, the CBI claimed.