Market regulator the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and the National Stock Exchange (NSE) “failed” to take action against the Adani Group, the Congress alleged on February 9, 2023 and asked if there was “pressure” on the SEBI to go easy on the group.
As part of the party’s “HAHK (Hum Adani ke Hain Kaun)“ series, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh posed a set of three questions to Prime Minister Narendra Modi about allegations of fraud and stock manipulation against the port-to-power conglomerate.
Mr. Ramesh alleged that the “failure” of market regulators such as the SEBI to protect Indian capital markets had “tarnished” their image and put a question mark on the integrity of India’s financial markets.
Addressing the Prime Minister, Mr. Ramesh said in a statement, “You [PM] have used strong words in the past, calling on world leaders at G20 meets ‘to eliminate safe havens for economic offenders’, to ‘track down and unconditionally extradite money launderers’ and to ‘break down the web of complex international regulations and excessive banking secrecy that hide the corrupt and their deeds’. Yet these same world leaders cannot have missed the high degree of tolerance you have shown for such activities by your own cronies”.
‘Retail investors hit’
“The collapse in publicly-listed stock prices following the publication of these allegations [Hindenburg Research report] has financially damaged lakhs of retail investors who invested in Adani Group stocks after being duped by artificially-inflated prices. The value of Adani Group stock crashed by ₹9,50,000 crore between January 24 and February 6, 2023,” the Congress leader said.
Mr. Ramesh pointed out that as far back as July 19, 2021, the Ministry of Finance had “admitted” to Parliament that the Adani Group was under investigation for violating SEBI regulations. “Yet Adani Group stock prices were allowed to spiral after that. When will SEBI be held accountable for this serious lapse and allowing the destruction of huge retail savings? Did the Modi government put pressure on the SEBI to go slow in its investigation?” he said.
The Congress leader also questioned the inclusion of Adani Enterprises in the widely used National Stock Exchange (NSE) Nifty 50 index in September 2022. He claimed that global stock indices had suspended Adani Group companies while the matter was investigated, but the NSE had “failed” to take any similar action to protect investors.
