Thaindian News

Kolkata, May 27 (IANS) The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and National Stock Exchange (NSE) will soon have exchanges under them to facilitate access to equity market for small and medium enterprises (SME) sector, a senior official said Friday.

“The ministry’s mandate is to facilitate the access to equity market for SME sector,” Uday Kumar Verma, secretary in the micro, small and medium enterprises ministry, told reporters here.

“We will begin with BSE and NSE, and by next year we may concentrate on regional exchanges,” he added.

“Madhu Kannan, the CEO of Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), called yesterday and he informed me that he has got a letter informing him that the SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) has approved that the BSE would set up an exchange for SMEs. He said that a similar letter has been issued to the NSE,” Verma said on the sidelines of a programme organised by the Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

“He (Kannan) said that BSE is contemplating to set up an exchange most likely by September this year. And this would be some kind of subset of BSE rather than a different exchange,” Verma said.

Noting this was actually a successful model abroad, he said Britain, for instance, had a very vibrant stock exchange for SMEs.

“We have a lot of deliberations last months. We have recommended various things in terms of entry barriers. Substantial concessions have been given by SEBI. Another important thing is not only people should have adequate access to the exchange but investors’ interest should be protected,” Verma said.

The central government will come up with 25 to 30 clusters of SMEs across the country, Verma said, adding the government had allocated Rs.80 crore for the clusters this fiscal.