The Adani group
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YEAR-WISE DEVELOPMENTS
1993-2005: The allotment of [mainly government] land to the Adani group
4 Gujarat CMs have given land to Adani
TNN | Apr 16, 2014 The Times of India
Records show the Adani group first got wasteland in Mundra from the Cogress-backed Chimanbhai Patel government in 1993 and then from another Cogress-supported government headed by Shankersinh Vaghela in 1997.
The group subsequently got more wasteland from BJP governments headed by Keshubhai Patel in 1999 and Narendra Modi in 2005. While it has been alleged that land given to Adani was of the size of Vadodara, the Ahmedabad-based group has got 7,350 hectares, as against Vadodara city's area of 15,900 hectares.
The largest chunk — 5,590 hectares at Rs 14.50 per sqm — was handed over to the group in 2005 by the Modi regime for development of an SEZ. Adani group officials insist that the entire stretch where the Adani port and SEZ is now located was completely barren.
2010: Rajesh Adani gets bail
February 28, 2010: The Indian Express
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) today arrested Rajesh S Adani,the Managing Director of the Rs 26,000 crore Adani Enterprises Ltd,on the charges of evasion of customs duty and undervaluation fraud tentatively pegged at Rs 1.7 crore in Goa. The CBI team from Goa picked him from his home at Vastrapur in Ahmedabad around 7 am.
Later in the evening,Adani was granted interim bail from the Gujarat High Court.
Designated senior counsel B B Naik who appeared for Rajesh Adani,said Rajesh’s elder brother Vasant Adani had moved a habeaus corpus petition in the Gujarat High Court seeking that he should be produced before the court immediately as CBI has detained him without providing any reasons or details. The next hearing in the case is posted for March 2.
The CBI had originally planned to present Adani at the Rural Magistrates Court here to seek a transit remand and a large crowd of media persons and lawyers of the Adani group waited for them there to turn up. But,the investigating agency changed its plans at the last moment and a CBI team flew with Adani to Mumbai in the evening en route to Goa where they said he will be presented before a magistrate. CBI sources said this was because the situation was getting heated up in Gujarat.
Rajesh Adani is the younger brother of the groups founder chairman Gautam Adani,who figures among the 10 richest Indians in the Forbes list.
Rishiraj Singh,CBI deputy director (Western region),told The Sunday Express that Rajesh Adani was arrested for undervaluation fraud related to import of naphta and petroleum products in Goa during 2006-2007. Singh said CBI sleuths also raided Adanis home and premises during the day. According to Singh,the CBI sleuths had also raided the Mumbai home of the co-accused in the case,Ramakant Pilani,who heads a Mumbai-based firm Ganseh Benzoplast Ltd,but failed to nab him.
A case in this regard was registered in January 2008 by the Goa Anti-Corruption Bureau of the CBI. Singh added that cases have been filed against nine senior officials of the Goa Customs in the same case.
This is the second time that Rajesh Adani had been arrested. In 1999,the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence had arrested him at Bhuj charging him with a similar duty evasion fraud worth Rs 1.4 crore. Soon after his arrest and orders of the local magistrate to remand him,Adani had claimed to have backache and spent time at a Bhuj hospital,until an appeal was moved at the Gujarat High Court which allowed him bail.
This time,CBI decided to take Adani to the Civil Hospital in Gandhinagar for a full check up,and then to the Cardiology department of the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital,before presenting him before the local magistrate to seek the transit remand to take him to Goa.
Dipak Damor,SP CBI (Gujarat),said the CBI team from Goa had arrived on Friday evening but arrested Adani from his home only in the morning. The CBI decided to take him for medical examination before the transit so as to avoid any claims of medical complications later.
The Adani group,meanwhile,issued a statement claiming that the petroleum products that they imported were on behalf of the license and permission holders and it was the latter who were responsible for fulfilling all formalities and the payment of duties.
It observed that the Customs had not issued any showcause notice to Rajesh Adani or the Adani group in this regard and maintained that the CBI had issued his arrest memo without providing any reasons or details.
Significantly,the Adani group statement also claimed that Rajesh Adani was not responsible for any day-to-day business operations. On the other hand,the groups website says: He (Rajesh Adani) is in charge of day-to-day operations of the Company and has been responsible for developing the business relationships of the Company. He also handles the marketing and finance aspects of the Company.”
Meanwhile,Adanis residence 14,Surajya Bungalows,Vastrapur remained deserted except for armed private security personnel. The guards said his family left immediately after the CBI sleuths had arrived at the house.
Imported consignments
- Three consignments of imported naptha and furnace oil were kept by the Adani group at a warehouse in Goa,which was licenced to store only restricted items. According to CBI officials,the licence of the warehouse had expired as well. CBI sources said Adani Enterprises Ltd had reportedly been trading with Ganesh Benzoplast for a long time and is suspected to have stored other earlier consignments there as well.
- CBI officials said these consignments were kept at the Goa warehouse after being imported by Adani Enterprises Ltd,earlier known as Adani Exports.
- CBI sources said they are now verifying all the documents of the Advani group’s imports in the recent past. The details of the warehouses where the group stores imported goods are now being ascertained,said an official.
2019
HC relief for in ₹29k cr imports case
Oct 18, 2019: The Times of India
A Bombay high court order has brought to a halt an overseas investigation by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence into the alleged Rs 29,000-crore overvaulation of Indonesian coal imports by the Adani Group.
The high court quashed all Letters Rogatory (LR) sent by DRI to 14 countries, including Singapore and UAE, seeking information into the alleged overvaluation. An LR is a formal request to another country, seeking judicial assistance in accessing information on an offshore entity in a probe.
DRI is probing at least 40 companies, including the Essar Group, for overvaluation of imports. TOI was the first to report on the scam in its December 14, 2014, edition.
Making it clear that it hasn’t gone into the merits of the LRs, the high court said: “We have only dealt with the contention as to whether it was permissible for the magistrate to issue such a Letter Rogatory without following the procedure mandated under the Criminal Procedure Code.”
The DRI began probing a non-cognisable offence without obtaining the necessary permission from the magistrate and in such circumstances, the LRs issued do not meet the test, said a bench of Justices Bharati Dangre and Ranjit More.
Implication
The case deals with a fundamental question regarding the commission of offence punishable under Customs Act, 1962 and whether or not, DRI is entitled to take recourse to the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 for issuance of the Letter of Rogatory by the Magistrate. The Bombay high court held that this provision of the CrPC is not an independent island on which any investigating/ inquiring authority can jump on without taking recourse to filing of a FIR and hence the letter rogatory issued by the DRI stands quashed.
