Senior Advocate Harish Salve said the US court’s direction asking the DOJ to explain dropping charges against Gautam Adani is a routine procedure. He explained that under the American system, prosecutors control decisions to proceed or withdraw cases, unlike greater court control in India.
Senior Advocate Harish Salve said that US District Judge Nicholas Garaufis’ order asking the US Department of Justice (DOJ) to explain its decision to drop charges against Gautam Adani is a routine step and described it as “a very normal procedure.”
speaking to media, Salve said the American legal system allows the prosecuting authority to retain primary control over whether a case should proceed.
He stated,
“This is a very normal procedure. The DOJ is the prosecuting agency. They brought the prosecution and have now applied for dismissal of the case. Since the matter is before the court, the court can ask for the reasons. That is exactly what has happened here,”
Salve added,
“Unlike the Indian courts, which exercise much greater control over decisions to withdraw a prosecution, the American system is different. The DOJ is in control of the cases. They decide whether to prosecute or not prosecute,”
He noted that recently, a US judge asked the DOJ to explain why it dropped criminal charges against industrialist Gautam Adani, and required the agency to provide further details by the following month. The judge, however, chose not to formally dismiss the case yet, after a request had been made by Adani’s lawyers.
This development came after Adani urged the court to formally dismiss the criminal charges against him following the DOJ’s statement last month that it would no longer pursue the prosecution. Adani was charged in 2024 for allegedly agreeing to bribe Indian government officials, so that a subsidiary of his Adani Group could obtain approval to develop a solar plant. The charges also alleged that Adani and his associates misled US investors by giving reassuring information about the company’s anti-corruption practices.
Separate from the DOJ action, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit in November 2024, accusing Adani Group founder Gautam Adani and his nephew Sagar Adani, alleging they misled investors by not disclosing a bribery scheme allegedly connected to officials of the Indian state, and the SEC framed its case under US securities laws. Adani denied the allegations, stating that the SEC’s claims connected to a 2021 bond sale by the group’s renewable energy arm, Adani Green Energy Ltd (AGEL), are legally defective on multiple grounds.
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Just last month, the DOJ permanently dropped all criminal charges against Adani and Sagar Adani, effectively ending the high-profile securities and wire fraud proceedings in New York.
On behalf of Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani, and Vineet Jain, their lawyers from Sullivan and Cromwell LLP wrote to Nicholas G. Garaufis, United States District Judge at the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York, concerning the pending resolution of the cases. In their letter, the lawyers requested the court to grant the DOJ’s dismissal motion and also address the SEC’s pending consent judgments.
The letter stated,
“We respectfully ask the Court to grant the Department of Justice’s motion to dismiss the Indictment with prejudice and the Securities and Exchange Commission’s motion to enter the pending Consent Judgments resolving its claims. For the Court’s convenience and consideration, we set forth below some background regarding the allegations and pending resolutions in each case, along with the law governing the standard of review for such motions”
According to the record, on November 20, 2024, the DOJ unsealed its indictment against Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani, Vineet Jain, and others. The indictment alleged that the Adani DOJ defendants conspired to commit securities fraud and conspired to commit wire fraud in connection with 2021 and 2024 bond offerings as well as 2021 and 2023 syndicated bank loans. The same day, the SEC filed its complaint against Gautam Adani and Sagar Adani, alleging violations of Section 17(a) of the Securities Act, Section 10(b) of the Exchange Act, and Rule 10b-5.
Adani’s legal team has said the indictment and complaint do not allege any US bribery offences against the defendants named in the DOJ case, and they further argued that no investor losses are claimed from the alleged transactions.
They said,
“They also do not allege any investor losses arising from any of the four transactions. Both the 2021 and 2024 bond offerings were issued pursuant to Regulation S and Rule 144A, promulgated under the Securities Act of 1933. As relevant here, under Rule 144A, those offerings were available only to Qualified Institutional Buyers (“QIBs”), which are large and sophisticated institutions that own or invest more than $100 million in securities. Id. § 230.144A(a)(1). The 2021 bond offering has matured, and all interest payments have been made. The 2024 bond offering has missed no interest payments. The 2021 loan has been repaid in full, and the 2023 loan is not in default,”
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