The exchange has asked the company to reconsider its record date of November 24 and push it to December 10 so that investors would know of the record date 42 days prior to its coming into effect.

According to the listing agreement, a company is supposed to inform the stock exchange about its record date at least 42 days in advance, considering the no-delivery period in the interim, which goes on for four trading cycles.

The company has fixed November 24 as the record date for the purpose of dividend payout of Rs 1.20 per share.

In the case of Satyam, BSE says that it has not received any intimation from the company at all. It was taken by surprise when the National Stock Exchange (NSE) announced the record date of November 24, on October 27.

The company has, however, strongly disputed the exchange'sclaim of failing to inform it on time. "We had earlier sent the notice to the company through courier. We have subsequently faxed a copy of the letter intimating the BSE about the record date on October 27. We have the confirmation note also. However, they have failed to acknowledge these letters and have asked us to reconsider the record date," explained Ramesh Pai, assistant company secretary of Satyam Computers.

According to V Srinivas, vice president finance, the company secretary AR Rao will meet senior BSE officials on Thursday.

Srinivas, further explained that they have sent the copies of the two page letter about the record date to all the exchanges by courier on October 12, which had been delivered on October 16. "The regional exchange, Hyderabad has also received the copy on October 14 itself. We have abided by all the byelaws of the listing agreement and we have the confirmation notes both from the courier company and the fax note," he added.

Following the complaint from the exchange, SatyamComputers had on Wednesday agreed to push back its record date to December 10. But there was a problem in this as the company had already notified NSE and its regional stock exchange, Hyderabad Stock Exchange, of its record date and the scrip had already entered the no-delivery period on these bourses.

Any change in this, would require the company to take up the matter with these exchanges and this may be done on Thursday.

It should also be recalled that the National Stock Exchange (NSE) announced the record date on October 27 after the closure of the market. On Wednesday the scrip moved into no-delivery at the bourse.

However, on Tuesday evening the scrip moved up significantly on kerb as soon as NSE falshed the no-delivery period after market hours. The scrip shot up by over 1.5 per cent to trade at Rs 600, at the kerb market on the announcement of the no-delivery by the NSE. According to market sources, the announcement which came in late after the closing of the official session took the market bysurprise and could have led to a number of investors especially the bears trapped.

However, it provided an edge to the speculators who jacked up the scrip price to a high of Rs 600 against the official close of Rs 592. Price discrepancy continued to widen on Wednesday when the BSE had no intimation about the record date while the scrip traded at a premium of over 3 per cent at the NSE considering its first day of no-delivery on the bourse.

As per the listing agreement's clause 16, the record date has to be announced 42 days in advance. The byelaw specifies for a period of 42 days, prior to the record date inorder to intimate the investors about the no-delivery period, which continues for a period of four weeks upto the record date. It is felt that in the case of BSE where badla is prevalent, a day's notice to the exchange of announcing of no-delivery period, was not sufficient and the exchange is required to be informed atleast a week in advance.