NEW DELHI (TIP): President Pranab Mukherjee promulgated an ordinance allowing the Securities & Exchange Board of India to regulate any scheme involving pooling of funds under an investment contract as soon as the corpus touches Rs 100 crore. It will now have search and seizure powers and can also seek information, including call data records, related to securities transaction being investigated by it.

However, the search and seizure operations, meant to crack down on ponzi schemes, can only be undertaken after the Sebi chairman authorizes the action. The regulator has also been allowed to attach assets in case of non-compliance of orders. To deal with the problem of delayed justice in securities-related cases, the ordinance allows the creation of special courts to fasttrack the resolution of pending Sebi-related cases, the finance ministry said in a statement