Delay in hearing of PILs in Adani-Hindenburg case, SC assures to look into the matter

Supreme Court to consider plea for listing of PILs on Adani-Hindenburg dispute. Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for one of the petitioners, told a bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Mishra that these PILs were to be listed on August 28. However, the matter was postponed. To this, the CJI replied, 'I will check with the court registry.'

On July 11, the top court asked the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) about the status of its ongoing investigation into allegations of stock price manipulation by the Adani Group. The court had given time till August 14 to SEBI for an investigation and said that the investigation should be completed soon. Later, the capital markets regulator filed a status report on the Adani-Hindenburg probe and said it was awaiting information from the tax haven.

Sebi had said in its report that it has completed an investigation into all the allegations except two against Adani Group and is still awaiting information from five tax havens about the real owners of foreign investors investing in the group. The report said that out of the 24 cases being investigated, the findings in 22 are final. Without disclosing the outcome of its investigation, SEBI had given detailed details of the steps taken during its investigation, including related party transactions.

The regulator had said, 'Sebi will take appropriate action as per law based on the outcome of the investigation. The finalized investigation report includes allegations of stock price manipulation, alleged failure to disclose transactions with related parties, and possible violations of insider trading in certain shares of the group. On May 17, the apex court had given SEBI time till August 14 to complete the investigation into allegations of stock price manipulation by Adani Group.

The Supreme Court-appointed expert committee had said in an interim report in May that it found 'no clear pattern of manipulation' in billionaire Gautam Adani's companies and no regulatory failures. However, it cited several amendments made by SEBI between 2014 and 2019. On May 17, the apex court directed that copies of the report presented before it by the apex court-appointed expert committee headed by Justice (retd) A M Sapre be made available to the parties to assist them in further deliberations in the case.

It is noteworthy that the shares of Adani Group had fallen heavily after Hindenburg Research made several allegations against the business group including fraudulent transactions and share-price manipulation. Adani Group rejected the allegations as false and said it complied with all laws and disclosure requirements.