The Supreme Court of India has ordered all the parties related to the Adani-Hindenburg case for filing their final submissions before 8th November.
CJI DY Chandrachud responded to Advocate Prashant Bhushan who appeared for one of the petitioners after he had informed the top informed that the case pertaining to Adani-Hindenburg was listed for hearing on August 28 got deferred and has has not been listed yet.
SEBI had filed a status report before the Top Court apprising it that out of 24 investigations arising out of the Hindenburg report, 22 are final in nature and 2 are interim in nature.
The Apex Court earlier on March 2, had directed the capital market regulator SEBI to investigate any violations of securities law by the Adani Group in the wake of the Hindenburg report, which led to a massive wipeout of more than 140 billion of the Adani Group’s market value.
The Apex Court had constituted an expert committee on March 3, 2023 to review the regulatory mechanism in light of the Adani-Hindenburg issue.
The committee consisted of the following members– i) Mr OP Bhatt, ii) Justice JP Devadhar(former Bombay HC judge), iii) Mr KV Kamath, iv) Mr Nandan Nilekani and v) Mr Somashekhar Sundaresan and was
Headed by former SC judge Justice (Retd) Abhay Manohar Sapre, the committee comprised of OP Bhatt, former Bombay High Court judge Justice J.P. Devadhar, K.V. Kamath, Nandan Nilekani and Somashekhar Sundaresan.
The affidavit claimed that Bhatt, one of the members of the Expert Committee and former chairman of the State Bank of India, was presently working as the Chairman of Greenko.
It said since March 2022, Greenko and Adani Group have been working in a ‘close partnership’ to provide energy to Adani Groups facilities in India. The plea pointed out that this clear conflict of interest should have been pointed out by Bhatt himself.
Further, the affidavit submitted that Bhatt was also examined by the CBI in March 2018 in a case of alleged wrongdoing in disbursing loans to fugitive economic offender, Vijay Mallya.
It alleged that Bhatt served as the SBI chairman between 2006 and 2011 when the majority of these loans were advanced to Mallya’s companies.
CBI has alleged that the SBI-led consortium of lenders did not conduct any ‘forensic audit’ despite being aware of the ‘poor financial health’ of Mallya’s companies, it noted.
The affidavit also raises apprehensions against Somashekhar Sundaresan. It asserts that Sundaresan has been a lawyer representing Adani before various forums including the SEBI Board.