INDIA bloc demands JPC probe into Hindenburg allegations against Sebi chief

“This has tied the hands to the extent that ‘the securities regulator suspects misconduct but also complies with various provisions of the related regulations… It is this dichotomy that has led to Sebi drawing a blank globally’,” Ramesh said, quoting the Expert Committee.

Under public pressure after Adani’s horse bolted, the Sebi board reimposed stricter reporting rules on June 28, 2023. It told the Expert Committee on August 25, 2023 that it was probing 13 suspicious transactions. However, the probes never bore fruit, the senior Congress leader added.

He said the Hindenburg Research revelations showed that Madhabi and her husband invested in the same offshore funds in Bermuda and Mauritius that “Vinod Adani and his close associates Chang Chung-Ling and Nasser Ali Shahban Ahli invested in using money they made from overcharging for energy equipment”.

“It is believed that these funds were also used to acquire large stakes in Adani Group companies, in violation of Sebi regulations. It is shocking that Buch would have a financial interest in these funds,” Ramesh said.

“This raises fresh questions about Gautam Adani’s two meetings in 2022 in quick succession with Buch, soon after she became Sebi chair. Remember, Sebi was then supposedly probing Adani transactions,” Ramesh said, demanding that the government take immediate action to remove all conflicts of interest in Sebi’s probe into Adani Group. “The fact is that the apparent complicity of the country’s top officials can only be resolved by setting up a JPC to probe the full extent of the Adani mega fraud,” he said.

The opposition parties also accused the government of ending the Budget Session of Parliament a day early fearing a backlash over the issue. The Budget Session was scheduled to end on Monday but was concluded on Friday.

“If Parliament does not function, who is the biggest beneficiary?” asked Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha leader Derek O’Brien. The beneficiary is the government and that is why Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “shaky coalition” has again shortened the Parliament session, he said, adding that the INDIA alliance parties would have taken the government to task on Monday.

Trinamool Lok Sabha member Mahua Moitra said the Hindenburg Research report was evidence of “crony capitalism at its best”. In a post on X, she asked whether the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate will file cases under the Prevention of Corruption Act and Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

“One simple point – the chairman who invested in (and personally worked with) the very same funds that are under investigation, heads (the) organization charged with (the) fiduciary responsibility to find other owners of the fund, tells (the) Supreme Court and its six-member panel that he had ‘drawn a blank sheet of paper’ and that it was a ‘chicken and egg situation’ in his investigation into the ‘ownership’ of 13 entities. What greater conflict of interest and travesty of justice could there be?” Moitra asked.

Priyanka Chaturvedi, Rajya Sabha MP from Shiv Sena (UBT), said the Hindenburg Research report shows the extent to which the BJP top leadership is backing its favourite industrialist.

Even institutions like Sebi were being diluted by appointing so-called compromised people, she said. “The quid pro quo circle is getting wider and the modus operandi more sinister,” she added.

Buch and her husband Dhaval have rejected the allegations in the report, calling them “baseless claims and insinuations.” “They are all devoid of any truth. Our lives and finances are an open book,” they said in a joint statement.

First publication: Aug 11, 2024 | 3:17 PM IST