Text of a talk delivered by Abir Dasgupta at the Anti Fascist Grand Conference in Calcutta. The talk was in Hindi, this is the English original. The environmental and human rights struggle should not be framed solely as a fight against fascism. The Adani Group’s role is ideological, not just as a beneficiary of crony capitalism. The group is an exemplary product of Hindu Fascist political economy.
An AdaniWatch investigation finds that the 2014 election campaigning by India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a private jet owned by the Adani Group was not disclosed as election expenditure, potentially violating the law of the land. If payments were made to the relevant Adani company for the lease of its aircraft by Modi for election campaigning, they were not reported by Modi or the BJP to the Election Commission.
But with Howe identified, the denial of any relationship between it and the Adani group flew in the face of publicly available information, and was possibly a key reason for Deloitte resigning as APSEZ’s auditor a few months later. Howe Engineering Projects’ parent firms are described as Adani group entities on an affiliate’s website, and there are multiple trails of evidence linking Howe to the conglomerate owned by Gautam Adani’s brother Vinod Adani and associate Chang Chien-Ting.
AdaniWatch examines two examples where appointments of ‘independent directors’ to Adani Group companies have raised questions. One concerns a director whose financial firm has provided important financial advice to numerous Adani companies. Another concerns a director who appears to have been appointed before a mandatory ‘cooling-off period’ for former staff and others with a pecuniary relationship had expired.
Questions have been raised in the public arena about whether Adani Group companies should have been ‘more forthcoming’ about doing business with a legal firm in which Gautam Adani’s daughter-in-law is a partner. This story details 12 deals in which the legal firm provided advice either to the Adani company concerned or to another party to the deal. As a ‘related party’ to the Adani Group, should Paridhi Adani’s involvement have been formally disclosed to shareholders and stock exchanges?
The conclusion of SEBI’s investigation and the release of its results to the public may be a crucial turning point in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
In a three-part series, the Probe’s Ravi Nair, Abir Dasgupta, and Paranjoy Guha Thakurta revealed the glaring discrepancies in selecting the winning bidder for the disinvestment of the government-owned helicopter service provider Pawan Hans Limited. The Probe has learnt that the government has decided to introduce stringent clauses to the due diligence process on qualified bidders in disinvestment deals of public assets.
The Supreme Court-appointed expert committee in the Adani-Hindenburg case advocates for Adani’s exoneration and finds no regulatory failure by SEBI. The SC-appointed committee’s report itself exposes the limitations it faced.
The investigations by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) into transactions by Adani Group entities have been marred by controversy, raising questions about its ability to handle the high-stakes probe with transparency and efficiency. The Supreme Court of India stipulated a deadline of 2 May 2023 for SEBI to conclude its investigation. However, in May, in response to applications by SEBI, the court extended that deadline to 14 August 2023. SEBI’s floundering has brought the regulator under increased scrutiny.
