Thus, this is the first time the new finance secretary Ajit Kumar would be participating in the HLC meeting. For the first time, representatives of the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (Irda) would participate in the meeting of the committee consisting of the Union finance secretary, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Bimal Jalan and the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) chairman DR Mehta, on Thursday.

The HLC is also likely to approve norms pertaining to foreign institutional investors' (FIIs) investment in the futures market. The committee was formed to delineate the powers, authorities and responsibilities of various regulators over several subjects arising out of the changing regulatory scenario in the wake of liberalisation and globalisation initiatives of the government over the past decade.

The mutual fund industry had already been allowed to invest not more than $50 million in stocks abroad, but only in ADRs/GDRs of domestic companies. Sebi has been expressing itself in favour of expanding this scope to include more securities. After the formation of Irda, the issue of which of these regulators should oversee what part of the regulatory mechanism, including foreign investment ceiling, raising of stake by foreign investors, public issues and related aspects arose.

While foreign exchange regulations fall under the jurisdiction of the RBI, capital issues and related aspects are under the jurisdiction of the Sebi. The allocation of regulatory functions pertaining to the development of the secondary debt market between RBI and Sebi was resolved recently. Sebi sources said that the HLC was more of a sounding board for regulators where broad policies are discussed and then left to each individual regulator to implement and take follow-up action. Thereafter, stock-taking of those decisions will take place. "It's an open ended kind of a thing. HLC takes a set of issues and takes decisions on them at the meeting. It's a sounding board," a top Sebi official said.