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Mumbai, Aug 18 Shares worth over Rs 1,00,257 crore remain locked with 10,76,431 demat accounts being frozen for not having the mandatory Permanent Account Numbers (PAN) to trade in the stock markets.

This was stated by the Union Minister of State for Finance, Mr Pawan Kumar Bansal, in response to an unstarred question seeking details on whether the National Securities Depositories Ltd and the Central Depositories Services (India) Ltd had frozen accounts for not having PAN details.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India had made PAN mandatory for trading in the stock markets from January 1. The aim was to facilitate a sound audit trail.

Totally 25,21,542 demat accounts were frozen, of which 14,45,111 accounts had no shares in their portfolio, the Minister said.

According to data available, the two depositories maintain more than 105 lakh demat accounts, up from about 99 lakh at the beginning of this year.

But the number of active accounts, with investors having provided PAN details, is only about 80 lakh at present, compared to about 55 lakh when the suspension exercise began.

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