Mangalore: Investor Awareness Programme Held to Create Financial Literacy

Pics: Ramesh Pandith
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangalore (FR)

Mangalore, Feb 26: In an effort to create more awareness among investors and the common man on capital market an ‘investor awareness programme’ was organized at hotel Ocean Pearl here on Saturday February 25.

The meet was organized by Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in association with National Securities Depository Limited, (NSDL) India’s first and largest depository in India. The session which was presided over by SEBI and NSDL officials of Chennai and Mumbai provided an opportunity for investors to interact with the officials and clear their doubts and add to their existing knowledge on capital markets, apart from getting knowledge on various aspects of capital market.

Suresh B Menon, Regional Manager, SEBI, Chennai was the chief guest and Nitin Ambure, Vice President NSDL who was the chief guest, gave the keynote address. In his inaugural address Suresh Menon said that the investor awareness programme is an effort by SEBI and other Depositories to go out of the metros and educate people on capital markets. In his power point presentation Menon gave a brief account on how the capital market of India had evolved in the last two decades, the challenges it faced and how it withstood or rather overcame the financial crisis. He said SEBI was established by the government in 1992 as there was a need to set up an independent stock market regulatory body to oversee the work related to capital market.

Menon said “SEBI has brought about drastic reforms in the capital market and these reforms were primarily responsible for transforming Indian capital market to a great extent. These reforms also acted as insulators in India when financial crisis hit the global market”.

Suresh Menon lamented that in a country like India which has a population of 120 crores there are only 1crore 19 lakh Demat accounts which points out the poor financial literary among Indians. He also pointed out that Indian investors are not in the habit of long term investment, which he said is the need of the hour so as to reap good returns.

In his keynote address Nitin Ambure gave an overview of the depository system, what Demat account is and also details on how to operate a Demat account. He expressed satisfaction that despite the market being low NSDL has been able to witness an addition of one lakh Demat accounts every month, which he said is a symbol of the stability of our capital market. He however, cautioned the investors to exercise restraint while giving power of attorney to deal with their Demat account as a precautionary measure.

V Ramesh, Deputy Chief Executive of the Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI), who spoke on the technical session on Mutual Funds said though it is true that mutual funds don’t give any assured results, they work or yield well as long term investment plans. He advised the investors to follow simple rules like self-filling the application rather than leaving it to the depository, to avoid future complications. Ramesh also dealt in detail on the advantages of SIP (systematic investment plan) saying in SIP investor does not have to worry about good or bad times in the market.

Manjith Singh, Executive Director of Bangalore Stock Exchange, who conducted the second technical session on ‘investing in capital markets’ opined “India has prudent savers but not investors”. He called upon more and more people to get involved in capital market. He also advised the people to have diversified investments rather than putting all the money in one sector. While cautioning people not to put their entire savings in capital market he said if the investor’s objective is to invest for short term then mutual funds are the best option.

Soon after the technical session there was an interactive session and investors cleared their doubts and sought information from the officials on various aspects of capital market.