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Journalism of Courage
Hours after Gautam Adani, his nephew Sagar Adani and six others were indicted by US prosecutors in New York in an alleged Rs 2,029 crore bribery case, the Adani Group called the allegations baseless.
The spokesperson of the group, via a statement, said: “The allegations made by the US Department of Justice and the US Securities and Exchange Commission against directors of Adani Green are baseless and denied.”
The statement added: “As stated by the US Department of Justice itself, ‘the charges in the indictment are allegations and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.’ All possible legal recourse will be sought.”
“The Adani Group has always upheld and is steadfastly committed to maintaining the highest standards of governance, transparency and regulatory compliance across all jurisdictions of its operations. We assure our stakeholders, partners and employees that we are a law-abiding organisation, fully compliant with all laws,” the Group further stated.
According to the indictment, the bribes were allegedly offered to Indian government officials for securing “lucrative solar energy supply contracts” with state electricity distribution companies.
“This indictment alleges schemes to pay over $250 million in bribes to Indian government officials, to lie to investors and banks to raise billions of dollars, and to obstruct justice,” a press release issued by the US Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of New York, said quoting US Deputy Assistant Attorney General Lisa H Miller.
The US court filing further revealed that approximately Rs 1,750 crore (around $228 million) of the “corrupt payment” was offered to “Foreign Official #1” — an unnamed high-ranking Andhra Pradesh government official — in exchange for the official facilitating that the state’s distribution companies agreeing to purchase seven gigawatts of solar power from Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) under the manufacturing linked project.
However, the court filings did not reveal the identity of the “Foreign Official #1”, the US Issuer, Canadian institutional investor and the Indian energy company named in the court filings, saying that their “identity is known to the Grand Jury”.
The filings said “Foreign Official #1” was a citizen of India and from approximately May 2019 through June 2024, he served as a high-ranking government official of Andhra Pradesh.
