To contend that the indictment of Gautam Adani, his nephew, and their associates, in the United States has dealt a blow to the ambitions of one of India’s, and the world’s, richest men, would be an understatement. The prominent tycoon, whose proximity to Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the stuff of legends, has never before been hurt like this. His reputation is at stake. And with it, his business plans.
The 30,000-word report of the New York-based short-selling firm Hindenburg Research published in January 2023 that claimed that Adani was “pulling the largest con in corporate history”, and innumerable reports by investigative journalists, including ones at the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), pale into insignificance when compared to the gravity and the depth of the allegations against him, his family members, and others who work closely with them, by two agencies of the federal government of the US: the Department of Justice (DoJ) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the regulator of that country’s financial markets. The allegations are, in turn, largely based on investigations by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Despite the arrest warrant against him, Adani is trying to put up a brave front with the help of his public relations machinery. But he probably realises, as does his patron Modi, that after this round of civil and criminal charges, things can never be the same again. This is simply because no capitalist…
