This against a clearing corporation with a corpus of Rs 497 crore. Besides, the remaining four brokers have paid all but Rs one crore (out of a total estimated shortfall of Rs 10-12 crore at the exchange during this period) of their dues to the exchange and are in the process of paying up the balance amount.

In a statement issued on Monday, NSE said that it had declared Asian Securities and Stocks Ltd and Stenly Credit Capital Ltd, defaulters for failing to meet their obligations towards the settlement in June this year.

Their total outstanding is Rs 65 lakh. Two other members, Eden Financial and Fiscal Ltd have been declared defaulters for havingintroduced stolen shares and failing to rectify these or bring in funds with regard to these shares.

In addition to these, another six brokerage firms have been suspended. These are Broad Line Capfin, Indian Seamless Securities, NCM Neha Securities, Padmini Financial Services, Topaz Securities and Vinitha Associates Private Ltd.

NSE managing director RH Patil said that the dues of the defaulters are proof of the stand that the exchange had maintained that there was no payments crisis at the bourse.

Patil pointed out that the exchange allows a member to trade only upto seven times his base capital which is a minimum of Rs 70 lakh. When a member fails to bring in the funds in case of purchase of shares the securities are not delivered to the member and are instead available with the exchange to realise the dues. NSE sells these shares in the open market and at times allows the member to get a good bargain for these shares.

"After all this money is kept with us, there is very little scope for a member todefault to any major extent. What is important is to ensure that prices of scrips are not allowed to fall very steeply as it is this factor which leads to a member defaulting in the first place. The investors are safe and the exchange has ensured that it is in a position to recover a bulk of the dues from a member by keeping adequate deposits and limiting his exposure levels at the same time", said Patil. "This is the reason why a clearing corporation is set up. The fears of a huge payments crisis at NSE were misplaced", said Patil.

He added that a sub-committee set up by the exchange had prepared a time table for the six brokers to bring in their dues. While the remaining four brokers are bringing in their funds as per schedule only these two brokers have failed to do so and hence were declared defaulters by the NSE board on August 14.