US SEC says Modi govt has not delivered bribery case summons to Adani Group

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (US SEC) has been unable to serve summons to Gautam Adani, his nephew Sagar Adani, and the Adani Group in India. The US SEC, in a filing on Monday, August 11, told a New York Eastern District court that they asked India’s Ministry of Law & Justice for help in delivering the summons and complaint to the defendants in India, using the process set out in an international treaty. But so far, the authorities in India have not delivered the documents.

On 20 November last year, US prosecutors indicted the Adani Group’s founder and chairman, Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani, and others for alleged bribery, securities fraud, wire fraud and related conspiracies. The US SEC alleged that defendants paid bribes totalling Rs 2,029 crore to secure solar power deals with multiple states in India mediated by the Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI). 

The US indictment was based on the allegation that the Adani Group did not disclose to US investors about its “own involvement in a complex and high value bribery scheme,” the SEC said in its original complaint. Since February this year, the US SEC has been in correspondence with India’s Ministry of Law and Justice to serve notices to the Adani Group in India. 

In February, the US SEC first told the court that it had requested assistance from the law ministry in India to help with serving the summons. 

According to a report in March, the law ministry had sent the summons notice for Gautam Adani and others to an Ahmedabad court, which was supposed to serve Adani the papers at his address in the city. It is evident now that these papers have not been served in the past six months.

In a filing on August 11, the SEC reiterated that it was still trying to serve the group in India. 

“The SEC has also sent Notices of Lawsuit and Requests for Waiver of Service of Summons, including copies of the Complaint, directly to Defendants and their counsel, and the SEC has communicated with the India MoLJ. The SEC understands that those authorities have not yet effected service,” it said in its latest filing in the case. 

The US Sec has been in touch with India in accordance with the Hague Service Convention. Rule 5 (a) of the convention says that a Central Authority of the State (the US SEC in this instance) can itself serve a document or shall arrange to have it served by an appropriate agency (the MoLJ).

In March this year, The News Minute had reported that lawyers from the Adani Group were aiming to persuade their United States counterparts to “dismiss” the case filed by the US Department of Justice (DoJ) against Gautam Adani and others. The arguments then solely relied on the Donald Trump administration’s suspension of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) in February.

The charges against Adani, his 30-year-old nephew Sagar Adani, and other executives include violations of various sections of the US Securities Act. The company in question, Adani Green, was formed in 2015 in Ahmedabad. It is the renewable energy arm of the Group and operates an extensive portfolio of solar and wind power projects. 

The indictment in the case said that Adani “falsely” touted the company’s compliance with US laws in connection with a $750 million bond. 

The US cases emerge from the fact that between December 2019 and July 2020, the government-run SECI, a Navratna PSU, awarded tenders to the Adani Group and Azure Power to supply 12 gigawatts of solar-generated electricity at a specified price. 

At the time, the SECI was to find state power companies willing to buy electricity at higher prices. 

According to court documents, when the SECI was unable to do so, Azure and Adani colluded to “devise a scheme to offer, authorise, make and promise to make bribe payments to Indian government officials” in order to get state governments to enter into agreements with SECI. 

Alleged bribes worth Rs 2,029 crore were offered, including Rs 1,750 crore to officials from Andhra Pradesh and the state’s then Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy.

Court documents had also mentioned that Adani Group officials met with government functionaries from Maharashtra, Kerala, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, and Jammu and Kashmir to help SECI secure Power Sales Agreements (PSAs) with the states. 

Around 17 March 2023, Sagar Adani was served with a grand jury subpoena in the United States. FBI officials also seized his electronic devices “pursuant to a judicially authorised search warrant”.

The SEC filing on August 11 is below:

“Pursuant to the Court’s June 26, 2025 Status Report Order, plaintiff Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) respectfully submits this status report regarding its efforts to serve the Summons and Complaint on Defendants Gautam Adani and Sagar Adani (“Defendants”).  

Defendants are located in India and the SEC’s efforts to serve them are ongoing, including a request for assistance from Indian authorities to effect service under the Hague Service Convention for Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil or Commercial Matters (“Hague Service Convention”).  The SEC filed its Complaint on November 20, 2024, alleging that Defendants violated federal securities laws by making false and misleading representations about Adani Green Energy Ltd. in connection with a September 2021 debt offering.  (ECF No. 1.)  As Defendants are in India, service is governed by Rule 4(f) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (“FRCP”).  (See SEC Ltr. to Hon. N. Garaufis, dated February 18, 2025 (ECF No. 8).)  FRCP 4(f) imposes no time limit for service and allows the SEC to serve Defendants by any internationally agreed means reasonably calculated to give notice, such as the Hague Service Convention.  (Id.)  The SEC filed prior status updates concerning its ongoing service efforts on April 23, 2025, and June 27, 2025.  (ECF Nos. 9, 10.) As described in the SEC’s prior status updates, the SEC has requested assistance from India’s Ministry of Law & Justice (“India MoLJ”) under Article 5(a) of the Hague Service Convention in serving the Summons and Complaint on Defendants in India.  The SEC has also sent Notices of Lawsuit and Requests for Waiver of Service of Summons, including copies of the Complaint, directly to Defendants and their counsel, and the SEC has communicated with the India MoLJ.  The SEC understands that those authorities have not yet effected service. The SEC intends to continue communicating with the India MoLJ and pursue service of the Defendants via the Hague Service Convention, and will keep the Court apprised of its efforts.”

This report was republished from The News Minute as part of The News Minute-Newslaundry alliance. Read about our partnership here and become a subscriber here.