"I know where all the skeletons are hidden in the market"

Sebi Chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch talks about how knowing all the tricks in the market helps, corporate governance standards and more 

- Sourav Majumdar

Madhabi Puri Buch, 57, the first woman Chairperson of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), has completed a little over two years at the capital markets regulator. Buch is the second non-bureaucrat in about two decades to head Sebi. In an exclusive interview with Business Today’s Sourav Majumdar at the BT Most Powerful Women in Business Awards, Buch talks about her journey, her passion for technology and data, women at the workplace and her agenda for the remainder of her term. Edited excerpts:

Q: How would you describe your journey as the Chairperson of Sebi?

A: The most important thing with respect to my position as the Chairperson of Sebi is that I had the benefit of being a part of Sebi one level lower, as a whole-time member. I think the learnings and, as somebody called it, my ‘house training’ happened during those four and a half years. And it was also said to me at the time of my appointment as whole-time member that ‘we want you to get house-trained but not so house-trained that the purpose of bringing a private sector person gets defeated.’ So that balance between... bringing the public accountability as well as the spirit of the private sector and the entrepreneurial spirit—I think that was the mandate given to me and it was a big privilege to get that. And I think that is the balance that I have tried my hardest to maintain. In a sense it is not hard because when you have been in the markets for two decades and you understand and know the entire domain like the back of your hand, and then you have been a part of the regulator and the system and the ecosystem for five years; it is not that hard.