Gautam Adani, chair of Indian conglomerate Adani Group, addresses a gathering during the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit 2024 in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, India, Jan. 10, 2024.
Punit Paranjpe | AFP | Getty Images
Gautam Adani, chair of India’s Adani Group and one of the world’s richest people, was indicted in New York with others for an alleged multi-billion-dollar fraud scheme, authorities said Wednesday.
Adani and seven other defendants are accused of agreeing to pay more than $250 million in bribes to Indian government officials to obtain “lucrative solar energy supply contracts with the Indian government,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Brooklyn said.
Those contracts were projected to generate more than $2 billion in post-tax profits over two decades.
Adani allegedly met in person with an Indian government official on several occasions as part of the bribery scheme, prosecutors said.
Adani and two other defendants, his nephew Sagar Adani and Vneet Jaain, who are executives of Adani Green Energy Limited, are also accused of conspiracies related to allegedly lying to U.S. and international investors about the bribery scheme as they sought to raise capital from those investors.
A worker walks past rows of solar panels at the Adani Group- owned Khavda Renewable Energy Park in Khavda, India, Jan. 12, 2024.
Punit Paranjpe | Afp | Getty Images
The five-count indictment unsealed Wednesday also charged Ranjit Gupta and Rupash Agarwal, who are former executives in the renewable-energy company Azure Power, and three former employees of the Canadian institutional investor Caisse de Depot et Placement du Quebec with conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in connection with the bribery scheme by Adani.
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