US authorities are preparing to resolve long-standing criminal and civil fraud cases against Gautam Adani, Asia’s richest person and chairman of the Adani Group, effectively ending a high-profile investigation that has loomed over the Indian conglomerate for more than 18 months, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday.
According to people familiar with the matter, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) is expected to announce the dropping of criminal charges as early as this week. Parallel to this, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is advancing a settlement in its related civil fraud lawsuit, which is likely to include a monetary penalty.
The cases stem from a November 20, 2024, indictment unsealed in federal court in Brooklyn. Prosecutors accused Adani, his nephew Sagar Adani, and Adani Green Energy executive Vneet Jaain, along with other executives, of orchestrating a scheme to pay or promise more than $250 million in bribes to Indian government officials. The alleged bribes were intended to secure solar energy supply contracts worth billions of dollars in potential profits.
Authorities further alleged that the defendants concealed the bribery from US and international investors while raising more than $3 billion in capital, including funds from US investors, violating securities and wire fraud laws as well as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
Adani Group has consistently denied the allegations, describing them as “baseless” and vowing to pursue all legal recourse. No defendants appeared in US court, as they remain in India, complicating extradition efforts under the US-India treaty.
The development comes a month after A US federal judge granted a request from the defendants for a pre-motion conference, advancing their effort to dismiss a securities fraud lawsuit filed by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In the plea, Adani Group contended that the case involves Indian defendants, an Indian issuer, securities not registered or traded in the US, and conduct alleged to have occurred entirely in India, making it an improper extraterritorial application of US law. There are no plausible allegations linking Gautam Adani to drafting, reviewing, or approving any specific misstatements, or showing he even knew about them.
The plea further said that as SEC could not charge Adanis under the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the charges were filed as a securities fraud case. The filing also contended that the SEC’s case is impermissibly extraterritorial, noting the securities were not listed in the United States, the issuer is Indian, and the alleged misconduct occurred entirely in India. The plea stated that SEC failed to show any transaction in the USA, that is required to apply the US securities laws.
The criminal case had seen little public progress since late 2024, with the docket largely dormant. The parallel SEC civil action faced procedural hurdles over serving summonses on the Indian-based defendants, with India reportedly refusing cooperation at times.
While the DOJ can effectively drop charges against non-resident defendants without a formal trial, the SEC settlement is expected to resolve the civil matter with financial penalties rather than admission of wrongdoing, sources indicated.
This resolution, if finalised, would mark a major win for Adani and could ease concerns among global investors in Indian infrastructure and renewable energy sectors. It will also clear the decks for the conglomerate to return to international capital markets and resume its aggressive expansion strategy.
