C B Bhave to be next SEBI cheif

New Delhi, Feb 14 (UNI) Mr Chandrasekhar Bhaskar Bhave will be the next chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) official sources said here today.

Mr Bhave presently heads the country's leading depository, National Securities Depository (NSDL).

Sources in the Ministry of Finance said that Mr Bhave has been selected among a panel of candidates interviewed for the purpose as the present chairman Mr M Damodaran's three-year term in office ends on Friday.

Mr Damodaran has the enviable track record of heading two powerful yet troubled financial institutions - UTI and IDBI, before he came to his present position. Known for his frank and forthright views Mr Damodaran carried out major capital market reforms.

Mr Bhave is a former civil servant and one of the first senior executive directors to come on Sebi's board.

He quit the IAS, which he had joined in 1975 to take up the assignment of building NSDL.

UNI GS/PBB PDT BST1713