‘Be Exceptionally Vigilant’: FM Nirmala Sitharaman Issues Strong Warning to Securities and Exchange Board of India, Launches Mission Jagrook

Sending a strong signal to India’s financial markets regulator amid rising technology-led risks, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday asked Securities and Exchange Board of India and all regulated market institutions to remain “exceptionally vigilant” against emerging cyber threats, warning that a single successful cyberattack on a major exchange, depository or clearing corporation can destabilise markets at a national scale.

Addressing the 38th Foundation Day celebrations of SEBI in Mumbai, the Finance Minister said Artificial Intelligence-enabled cyber tools are making attacks faster, adaptive and more autonomous, thereby demanding an even faster evolution of defence systems across India’s capital market infrastructure.

Sitharaman also sounded alarm over the rapid spread of fake investment videos, cloned apps and deepfake financial promotions circulating on social media platforms, many of them impersonating public leaders and trusted institutions to dupe retail investors.

In this backdrop, she directed SEBI to massively scale up investor awareness campaigns on every major digital platform and in regional languages so that investor protection does not remain confined to urban English-speaking audiences.

Digitally launching SEBI’s nationwide investor awareness programme ‘Mission Jagrook’, the Finance Minister said public education must become as important as market regulation in the new era of technology-driven fraud.

Finfluencers Under Scanner

Backing SEBI’s recent crackdown on unregistered financial influencers, Sitharaman said the monetisation of uninformed retail investor trust cannot be tolerated in India’s rapidly expanding securities market.

While calling for enabling frameworks for responsible financial education, she made it clear that unlicensed advisory disguised as social media content poses a systemic investor-protection challenge.

The remarks assume significance at a time when millions of first-time investors are entering equities, mutual funds and digital investment products through online channels.

Push for One Nation, Seamless KYC

In another major policy prescription, the Finance Minister asked SEBI to lead the creation of simplified, common and digitally portable KYC norms across the securities ecosystem, saying user experience in financial services must improve substantially.

She said India now has both digital infrastructure depth and investor scale to create a frictionless KYC model that can become a benchmark across regulators.

Soft-touch But Smart Regulation

Sitharaman simultaneously endorsed a consultative and principles-based regulatory framework rather than overregulation, stating that soft-touch regulation supported by stakeholder consultation improves compliance and economic efficiency.

She said Indian markets are now deeply linked with global pools of capital and therefore SEBI’s regulatory conversations cannot remain purely domestic.

International regulatory engagement, she indicated, is now central to building global investor confidence in Indian capital markets.

SEBI Chairman Highlights Scale of India’s Capital Markets

Speaking on the occasion, Tuhin Kanta Pandey said India today has over 5,900 listed companies and more than 140 million unique investors, while market capitalisation has grown at nearly 15 per cent CAGR over the last decade.

Mutual fund assets have expanded at over 20 per cent annually, while the primary market is facilitating capital formation of nearly ₹10 lakh crore every year, underlining the growing systemic importance of robust and agile regulation.