•Hello and welcome to Walk the Talk. I’m in the heart of what has always been not just corporate Bombay but corporate India, and my guest this week is somebody who manages your fortunes in good times and bad times, but whose face you usually see in the media during bad times — C B Bhave, the SEBI Chairman. Welcome to Walk the Talk.

Hi, Shekhar.

•We were all trying to figure out what is the best time for us to have this conversation because either the markets were too volatile, or there was one crisis or the other. So, we thought when there seems to be a respite of maybe three days and when there is no crisis, let’s have this conversation.

Thank you for inviting me.

•So tell me about the last six months. You’ve just finished a year in this job, but the last six months have been more eventful than anyone would have expected in the whole tenure.

Yeah, especially in September. After September 15 when Lehman was allowed to go bankrupt, we had quite a crisis. The crisis got transmitted to the Indian market through the credit markets. It had its effect on the stock market as well because a lot of FIIs withdrew their money; hedge funds were reducing their leverage. So all around, there was withdrawal of money.

•So, did you have sleepless nights?

No, not really. I think the confidence we’ve got over the last 10 years or so is that our stock exchange settlement mechanism is very robust, and we did not have to postpone a settlement for even a single day. So since the paying and payout was happening on time without any difficulty, people had that confidence that this market can take the ups and downs in its stride.

... contd.