High Court to Begin Hearing Corruption Cases Against Adani, Essar and 40 Coal Companies

A petition filed in the Delhi High Court on September 20 has demanded that a Special Investigation Team be set up to probe Adani, Essar and 40 coal-importing companies for over-invoicing of power equipment and overpricing of fuel imports.

The petitioners – Centre for Public Interest Litigation and Common Cause – have stated that these companies siphoned off thousands of crores from the exchequer, as reported by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI).

Earlier in September 2016, the DRI had issued showcause notices to Adani Group and Essar Group for over-inflating the prices of capital goods imported by re-routing the goods through a third country.

But then a higher official at DRI cancelled the proceedings saying he didn’t “agree with the case of the department”.

This petition comes after the recent controversy that erupted when Paranjoy Guha Thakurta had published articles, hinting at the corruption by these companies amounting to thousands of crores of rupees, in the Economic and Political Weekly (EPW) while he was editor. Thakurta was removed from his post by the trustees after they received a legal notice from the Adani group for publishing the articles on the EPW website.

The petitioners have urged the court to initiate investigations into the corrupt practices of the companies that were causing huge losses to the revenues of the Government of India. They have argued that the DRI had investigated the matter but the executive was not taking requisite action to punish the culprits for their crimes.

The petition was admitted by the High Court and the first hearing will be held on October 25, 2017.