Weathering A Second Storm

A New Set Of Allegations Has Hit The Adani Group, Claiming Evidence Of Likely Stock Manipulation Through 'opaque' Mauritius Funds, Putting It Once Again On The Back Foot

- M.G. ARUN

IN yet another setback to the Adani Group, the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), a global network of investigative journalists, has claimed access to exclusive documents that allegedly show how hundreds of millions of dollars were invested in publicly traded Adani stocks through Mauritius-based opaque investment funds. OCCRP relied on files from multiple tax havens, bank records and internal Adani Group emails as part of its investigation that was first shared with two prominent foreign newspaper organisations and later made public on its website on August 31.

In at least two cases-representing Adani stock holdings that at one point touched $430 million (Rs 3,558 crore)-the mysterious investors were found to have ties with the group's majority shareholders, the Adani family. The two men-Nasser Ali Shaban Ahli and Chang Chung-Ling-have long-time business connections with the family and have also served as directors and shareholders in Adani Group companies and firms associated with Vinod Adani, group chairperson Gautam Adani's elder brother, the report alleges.

The documents show that two Mauritius-based funds-Emerging India Focus Fund and the EM Resurgent Fund-had invested and traded in large volumes of shares of four Adani companies between 2013 and 2018. Through these offshore firms, the two men spent years buying and selling Adani stocks via offshore structures that obscured their involvement and made considerable profits in the process, the report alleges. They also show that the management company in charge of their investments paid a Vinod-promoted company to advise them on their investments.