Adani’s foreign shareholders mess goes deep

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Editor's note: Business tycoon Gautam Adani’s billion-dollar empire has routinely faced attacks from critics who have alleged that all is not kosher with his meteoric rise. These attacks have so far been dismissed as being of no consequence, having their basis in rumours and baseless innuendos. Even the doubts raised last month over the foreign shareholders in Adani’s listed companies, which led to a Rs 1 lakh crore wealth erosion, were put down to a motivated attack.  However, this changed about 10 days back when minister of state for finance Pankaj Chaudhary said that there were active probes pending against the group.  Chaudhary was answering questions posed by Mahua Moitra, a member of parliament from the All India Trinamool Congress party. “SEBI is investigating some Adani group companies with regard to compliance with SEBI regulations,” Chaudhary told the Lok Sabha. “Further, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) is investigating certain entities belonging to the Adani group of companies under laws administered by it.” SEBI is short for the Securities and Exchange Board of India, the capital markets regulator.  Within hours of Chaudhary’s …