Former Attorney General of India and Senior Counsel Mukul Rohatgi on Wednesday (November 27, 2024) said that industrialist Gautam Adani, along with his nephew Sagar Adani, have not been named in key bribery or obstruction of justice charges in the indictment filed by United States prosecutors in a bribery case.
“……..I have gone through this indictment by the U.S. court. My assessment is that there are five charges or five counts. It is important to note that counts one and five are more important than the others, but neither in Count 1 nor in Count 5 is Mr. Adani or his nephew charged,” Mr. Rohatgi said.
“Count number 1 of the indictment is against certain other persons minus the two Adanis. It includes some of their officers and one foreign person…The first allegation is that there is a conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act framed by the US Parliament. In that, the Adanis are not named, their officers may be named,” the Former Attorney General of India said.
He detailed further, “There are two or three other counts relating to securities and bonds. In those three counts, the Adanis and others are named…This is a charge sheet alleging that these people, including Adanis have bribed Indian officials in Indian entities relating to the supply and purchase of power, but I do not find a single name or a single detail in the chargesheet as to who has been bribed, in what manner has he been bribed and the official belongs to such and such department. This charge sheet is completely silent, so I don’t know how one can respond to this kind of chargesheets…” he said.
Mr. Rohatgi stated that Adani was named under two counts that were related to security and bonds.
“It is like a chargesheet under the Indian penal laws. Count one is against certain other persons minus the two Adanis… That is the ‘Conspiracy to Violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act,’ called the ‘FCPA,’ similar to the ‘Prevention of Corruption Act’ in the Indian Parliament. So the first allegation is that there is a conspiracy to violate the FCPA framed by US Parliament. In that the Adanis are not named. Then there are two other counts related to security and bonds in which Adani and others are named. In the last count, which is a very important count relating to obstruction of justice. In that count, namely count number five, the Adanis are not named,” he added.
Congress accuses Modi govt of helping Adani cover up
Congress leader Jairan Ramesh said that “the Modani ecosystem” is denying the charges to control the damage.
This laughable attempt cannot dilute the seriousness of the charges levelled by U.S. agencies, Mr. Ramesh said referring to Mr. Rohatgi’s statement.
“There is no escaping the fact that the Department of Justice indictment clearly says that Gautam S Adani, Sagar R Adani, and others ‘devised a scheme to offer, authorize, make and promise to make bribe payments to Indian government officials in exchange for the government officials causing state electricity distribution companies to enter into PSAs with SECI’ (para 47)“, the Congress leader further said.
“It also says that they ‘offered and promised to Indian government officials approximately 2,029 crore rupees (approximately $265 million) in bribes in exchange for Indian government officials causing the state electricity distribution companies to execute PSAs’ (para 49)“, he added.
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