As early as 2015, a prominent Indian newspaper reported that everywhere that Modi went, 'Adani was sure to go'. This support has not always helped India. On the contrary, by brazenly promoting the oligarch’s ambitions, Modi has sometimes hurt his country’s relations with her neighbours as well as with other countries.
The growth of the Adani Group outside India over the past decade or so has been closely aligned with the diplomatic efforts of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Many of Adani’s international deals were struck soon after Modi’s official visits to certain countries or after heads of government visited India. Some of these interventions have backfired badly.
Here is a compilation of facts based on publicly available sources of information about how the Adani Group has expanded, or tried to expand, its operations in Australia, Bangladesh, Greece, Indonesia, Israel, Kenya, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Tanzania, and how some of these deals soured or fell through – often to the detriment of India’s interests.
In January 2023, after the US-based short-selling firm Hindenburg Research came out with a damning report alleging that the Adani Group was ‘pulling the largest con in corporate history’, Group spokespersons sought to describe the report as an attack on India’s sovereignty. As the spokespersons sought to conflate the country’s interests with those of Adani’s, they put out video clips of themselves against India’s national flag, the tricolour.
It was, therefore, more than ironical that by brazenly promoting the oligarch’s businesses, PM Modi ended up hurting India’s relations with countries such as Kenya, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
Opaque airport project in Kenya
The Adani Group was recently at the epicentre of protests in Kenya due to its involvement in a project to lease and modernise the country’s main airport. Kenya’s citizens, led by several civil society organisations, gathered in large numbers in the national capital, Nairobi, to oppose the project, which they claimed was against the country’s interests.
On 5 December 2023, as Kenyan President William Ruto was meeting Prime Minister Modi at Hyderabad House in New Delhi – the Indian government’s luxurious guest house for visiting dignitaries – together with government officials of the two countries, a surprise visitor made an appearance. He was Gautam Adani, one of India’s and one of the world’s richest men.
Modi had been discussing various topics with Ruto, one of which pertained to Indian ‘expertise’ for modernising airports. Less than three months after this meeting, in March 2024, the Adani Group submitted a detailed proposal to the Kenyan government for refurbishing Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA). The proposal outlined an investment of US$ 1.85 billion in exchange for a 30-year lease and an equity stake in the company running the airport.
The unusual aspect of the proposal was that in June 2024, two months after receiving the offer from Adani, the Kenyan government issued an advertisement inviting bids to modernise the JKIA. Petitions in courts have alleged that the government provided preferential treatment to Adani, disregarding a competing offer from an Argentinian company. A court in Kenya has temporarily stalled the project from moving ahead. Read more about the controversy here on AdaniWatch.
The airport deal was exposed by whistleblower Nelson Amenya who claimed in a tweet that the Adani Group had been cited for alleged ‘corruption, tax evasion and money laundering’ in several jurisdictions, including Switzerland, India and Sri Lanka. He has subsequently claimed that his actions as a whistleblower have resulted in death threats. Amenya, who currently resides in France, believes his disclosure has earned him powerful enemies.
A spokesperson for the Adani Group has refuted Amenya’s allegations and stated that it has ‘no knowledge’ about what he has claimed.
Before the controversy over the airport project broke out, Adani had reportedly secured a US $1.3-billion contract to construct high-voltage power lines in the country. The Kenya Electricity Transmission Company (Ketraco) had awarded a concession for a public-private partnership to build power transmission lines to a venture comprising a company in the Adani Group and Africa50, an infrastructure investment entity affiliated with the African Development Bank. On October 11, 2024, Adani signed the deal with a revised cost of US $736 million; the group will finance, construct, operate and maintain the transmission lines for a period of 30 years.
However, this project, too, faces legal hurdles. On 25 October 2024, it was reported that Kenya’s High Court had suspended the deal pending the court’s determination of a challenge brought by the Law Society of Kenya alleging the arrangement was unconstitutional and ‘tainted with secrecy’.
Former Prime Minister of Kenya, Raila Odinga, defended the controversial projects contracted to the Adani Group. Odinga, who has recently joined President Ruto's cabinet revealed, in a party meeting that he was introduced to the Adani Group by Modi.
He said: ‘Mr Modi organised a visit by a Kenyan delegation to the company’s projects, including a port, a power plant, a railway line and an airstrip developed in a swamp donated by the government of India… After the Kenya government delegation came back, the company expressed interest in investing in Kenya.’
According to the Kenya-based news publication, Nation, Adani has been linked to a US $806-million Universal Health Coverage (UHC) information system through Apeiro Limited. The health-care project became controversial after it became known that costs had surged by approximately US $414 million above initial estimates.
A company called Safaricom had bid around US $358 million to implement the Kenyan government’s universal healthcare coverage (UHC) plan, including the installation of digital health solutions and data-management systems. After Safaricom formed a consortium with UAE-based Apeiro Limited (that is linked to Adani) and Konvergenz Network Solutions, the project costs skyrocketed.
Key components of the project, such as the establishment of data centres and security systems, saw their prices increase up to sevenfold. The costs of providing security and support solutions rose from around US $7 million to approximately US $38.5 million, while the costs of setting up relevant cloud-data centres climbed from roughly US $5.8 million to about US $37.8 million.
Court documents filed by Senator Okiya Omtatah allege that the revised bid disregarded initial agreements and shifted the financial burden to taxpayers by levying service charges on healthcare-related transactions, thereby raising concerns about the influence of foreign interests on Kenya’s public infrastructure.
Adani in Tanzania: competing against China?
The Bagamoyo port project was conceived in early 2010 as a three-way joint venture involving the government of Tanzania, China Merchants Holdings International (CMHI), and the State General Reserve Fund (SGRF) of Oman. The US$ 10-billion deal was part of China’s famous Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to connect continents and was aimed at transforming Tanzania into a major trade hub in East Africa.
In 2015, the Tanzanian government led by President John Magufuli raised concerns about the Bagamoyo port project impacting his country’s sovereignty. Magufuli’s administration reportedly grew wary of China’s demands for a 99-year lease and ownership control over the project. Negotiations stalled, and CMHI exited the deal in 2019. Magufuli refused to accept what he saw were unequal terms. The project was put on hold.
In 2016, Indian PM Modi visited Tanzania. His visit marked India’s growing interest in developing Tanzania’s infrastructure. After Magufuli’s death in 2021, his successor President Samia Suluhu Hassan welcomed foreign investment for the port project. In October 2023, Hassan visited India, where she and Modi signed several agreements aimed at deepening economic ties between the two countries.
A year earlier, in 2022, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Limited (APSEZ) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with AD Ports (Abu Dhabi Ports) to jointly pursue strategic investment opportunities in Tanzania, reportedly including the ‘construction of a major port in Bagamoyo, with some $1bn funding; a $600m plan for the Mangapwani multipurpose port in Zanzibar; and a $300m investment in a new oil jetty in the Dar es Salaam harbour also on the drawing board.’
Apart from the Bagamoyo port, Tanzania has another major port at Dar es Salaam. In May 2024, Adani International Ports Holdings Pte Ltd (AIPH), a wholly-owned subsidiary of APSEZ, signed a 30-year concession agreement with the Tanzania Ports Authority to operate and manage a container terminal at the Dar es Salaam port.
On 3 October 2024, a report by Bloomberg quoted an official from Tanzania saying the government of Tanzania is in talks with the Adani Group for a US $900-million public-private partnership project to construct high-voltage power lines.
Failed port project in Myanmar
In 2019, APSEZ announced it had secured the rights to develop a terminal at the port at Yangon, the largest city in Myanmar, through a competitive global bid. The company planned an investment of US $290 million to build and operate this port, viewing it as a strategic move to expand its presence in South-East Asia. By 2020, it had already invested around $127 million, which included an upfront payment of US $90 million for leasing land.
In July 2019, Karan Adani, CEO of APSEZ and the son of the head of the Adani Group, Gautam Adani, met Myanmar’s General Min Aung Hlaing, the military leader who would later lead a coup in the country. General Hlaing had earlier visited Mundra port in Gujarat, India, and allegedly exchanged gifts with officials of the Adani Group (a report later denied by Adani). By then, the General and the Myanmar military were facing accusations of human rights violations and atrocities, including genocide against the Rohingya people in 2017.
The US government imposed sanctions on the General Hlaing-led military junta, but Adani continued its operations, defending them as legitimate. Reports emerged that Adani had paid $30 million to the Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC), an entity linked to the junta in Myanmar. Adani denied any wrongdoing and insisted that its investment in the port project complied with extant rules on global sanctions.
In February 2021, the Myanmar military overthrew the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi in a violent coup. Brutal crackdowns on civilians engaged in widespread protests resulted in the deaths of over 1000 people. The US and other Western countries then imposed further sanctions on Myanmar’s military regime. Human-rights organisations and advocacy groups such as Amnesty International raised concerns about the junta’s association with the port. AdaniWatch ran several stories that pointed to the links between the Adani Group and general (now dictator) Hlaing.
In April 2021, following the coup, Adani Ports was delisted from the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. The following month, Adani hinted at a potential exit from the port project, citing risks of sanctions and a public backlash.
In August 2021, Adani announced it would not go ahead with the Myanmar project. In May 2022, a share purchase agreement (SPA) was signed with the MEC to exit the port project in May 2022. The initial sale price was set at US$260 million. The sale was, however, delayed due to regulatory hurdles and challenges in completing contractual conditions.
The delays dragged on into 2023, forcing Adani to renegotiate the terms of the sale. In May 2023, APSEZ completed the sale of its Yangon port assets for only $30 million, a sharp reduction from the initial investment of nearly $195 million. The financial hit from the sale impacted the company’s overall profits, particularly in the fourth quarter of 2023, resulting in what was described as an ‘impairment loss’ of ₹12.73 billion (US $152 million).
Political firestorm in Sri Lanka on Adani
Sri Lanka’s newly-elected left-oriented government headed by President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has decided to reconsider the $440 million wind power project granted to the Adani Group by the previous administration in the island nation south of India. The Supreme Court of Sri Lanka was informed that the review was initiated after a recent Cabinet meeting after doubts about the transparency of the deal were expressed.
Adani’s journey in Sri Lanka started with the Group developing a key part of Colombo’s port, an important hub for international shipping because of its geographical location. What started as a promising venture soon became a turbulent episode for the Indian conglomerate. Political controversy, public protests, and eventually a significant shift in plans ensued.
In 2019, the Sri Lankan government sought to expand Colombo Port, its key economic asset. India had for long been attempting to deepen its influence in Sri Lanka in view of the growing presence of China in that country. China had already established the massive Hambantota Port in Sri Lanka with a lease period of 99 years.
Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone (APSEZ) saw the development of the East Container Terminal (ECT) at Colombo Port as a lucrative project because of its deep-water berths and ability to accommodate large container ships, making it a strategic investment for India. In 2020, after several rounds of discussions and negotiations, the Sri Lankan government, then headed by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, entered into an agreement to involve India (through the Adani Group) and Japan in the development of the ECT. The deal was structured in a way that gave 51% ownership to the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA), while India (through Adani) and Japan would hold 49%.
As the deal progressed, there was strong resistance from trade unions, port workers and opposition political parties – they expressed concern about ‘handing over such a vital national asset’ to a foreign firm. They argued that given the ECT’s importance, it should be owned entirely by Sri Lankans. There was pressure on the government with port workers going on strike and public demonstrations being held across the country. In 2021, AdaniWatch.org reported these events in detail.
Faced with growing unrest and political pressure, the Sri Lankan government decided to cancel the ECT project in February 2021, thereby dealing a major blow to Adani. The decision also strained relations between Sri Lanka and India, as the cancellation was seen as a setback to India’s geopolitical ambitions in the Indian Ocean.
To cushion the diplomatic crisis, the Sri Lankan government proposed that Adani develop the West Container Terminal (WCT) at Colombo Port. The deal to develop the WCT was structured differently from that for the ECT. It was a 35-year build, operate, and transfer (BOT) agreement, wherein Adani would have a higher stake (85%) in the entity executing the project, with the Sri Lanka Ports Authority holding the remaining 15% share. The WCT, while important, was not as strategically located as the ECT. Adani accepted the substitute deal.
By then, Adani had started entrenching itself in the island nation’s energy system by way of a large wind-power project. This came in the wake of India extending $4 billion in credit during Sri Lanka’s 2022 financial crisis.
In November 2021, a Sri Lankan official testified before a parliamentary committee that Indian Prime Minister Modi had exerted pressure on Sri Lanka’s President to award the wind-power project in Mannar to Adani. Days later, the official – the chairman of Sri Lanka’s Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) – resigned. This testimony came right after Modi met former Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa during a climate summit in Glasgow. Following an uproar, the CEB official retracted his statement even as the video recording of his public testimony quickly spread on social media.
This wasn’t the first time Adani’s role in Sri Lanka faced scrutiny. In March 2022, after an agreement was signed between the CEB and Adani Green Energy to develop renewable energy projects in Mannar and Pooneryn, Sri Lanka’s main opposition party, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), claimed Adani entered through a ‘backdoor’. They accused President Gotabaya Rajapaksa of favouring Adani, a close ally of Indian Prime Minister Modi, by granting him preferential treatment over competitors. The SJB also criticised the decision to amend the electricity law to eliminate the competitive bidding process for projects exceeding 10 MW capacity, alleging that it was done to favour Adani.
The controversy deepened in June 2024, when Sri Lanka’s Public Utilities Commission denied Adani approval for setting up a 484 MW wind-power plant. In August, the project became embroiled in legal disputes with the Supreme Court ordering government entities—including the Board of Investment and the Central Environmental Authority—to submit their objections to the wind-power project.
As mentioned, Sri Lanka’s new President Dissanayake, a long-time critic of Indian influence on Sri Lanka, vowed to cancel the Adani wind-power project during a talk show on television. ‘Yes, we will definitely cancel it, as it threatens our energy sovereignty,’ he declared, referring to the contentious agreement to set up projects in Mannar and Pooneryn in the northern part of the country. The agreement, formalised earlier in 2024 through a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), had been challenged before the Supreme Court.
After his victory in Sri Lanka’s Presidential elections on October 1, 2024, Dissanayake informed the Supreme Court that his administration would reconsider the approvals granted by the previous government to Adani’s wind projects.
‘Discriminatory’ power contract with Bangladesh
In June 2015, Modi visited Bangladesh and pledged India’s support in helping meet the country's electricity needs. Two months later, the Adani Group signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB). This led to the establishment of a 1600 MW coal-fired power plant in Godda in Jharkhand in eastern India that was dedicated to exporting power to Bangladesh.
There is no power project anywhere in the world like the one at Godda. The highest reserves of coal in India are situated in Jharkhand. Yet Adani’s Godda power plant does not use the copious supplies of coal from the state where it is located. The coal used by the project travels in ships almost 9000 kilometres from the Abbot Point port in northern Australia to the Dhamra port in Odisha. Both the coal mine in Queensland and the port on India’s east coast are controlled by entities that are part of the Adani Group.
After arriving in Dhamra, the coal is moved along leased railway lines to Godda located 600 km away. (The upgrading of this railway line led tribal people facing displacement to protest against it) After electricity is generated at the Godda power plant, it is transmitted more than 100 km to Bheramara in Bangladesh, from where it redistributed.
In 2017, during a visit by the then Prime Minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina to New Delhi, the two governments signed an agreement to implement the project. Despite opposition in Bangladesh that the terms of the agreement were heavily tilted in Adani’s favour, the project, complete with its logistical incongruities, went ahead. Concerns about the pricing of electricity subsequently emerged.
The contract has been described as excessively expensive and tilted against the interests of Bangladesh. Reports indicate that Bangladesh will pay over five times the country’s average electricity cost for power from the Adani plant. Even if the plant produces no electricity, Bangladesh would still be liable for annual capacity and maintenance charges totalling $450 million over a period of 25 years.
In 2023, an AdaniWatch article questioned the legality of the contract between Bangladesh and the Adani Group due to Adani’s inclusion of costs that appeared to be non-existent. The Power Purchase Agreement (PPA), signed in November 2017, separately lists VAT (Value-Added Tax) and other taxes. However, India had implemented the comprehensive Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime in July 2017, four and a half months before the PPA was finalised. The GST regime replaced most indirect taxes, including central excise duty, service tax, additional customs duty, surcharges, state-level VAT, octroi (a transport-related tax), and levies for interstate goods movement. The question arose as to why these outdated tax provisions were included in the PPA?
Additionally, the Godda project was designated as a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in February 2019, 15 months after the power contract with Bangladesh was signed. SEZs in India benefit from significant tax exemptions. APJL is exempt from taxes on nearly all imported items and enjoys long-term income tax waivers.
The agreement was reportedly signed under political influence and without standard revisions that would normally be part of such contracts. This has been attributed to the close relationship between Adani and Modi. Despite Bangladesh’s decision to cancel several coal-based power projects in 2021 due to environmental concerns and the global push for renewable energy, the Godda project was retained untouched.
In July and August 2024, there were violent protests against the government in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, and other parts of the country. On 5 August 2024, Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled and took refuge in India. Two days later, Nobel laureate and long-time Hasina critic Muhammad Yunus was appointed head of an interim government.
Subsequently, Bangladesh has formally requested a revision of the agreement with Adani. Transparency International Bangladesh, a Berlin-based civil society organisation, has labelled the BPDB-Adani contract as ‘unequal, opaque and discriminatory’. The deal contributed to the rise of anti-India, anti-Hasina sentiments in Bangladesh.
A week after Hasina came to India, on 12 August, the Indian government amended cross-border electricity export guidelines, benefiting the controversial Godda coal-power plant. The amendment was seen as a measure to prevent losses for Adani after the regime change in Dhaka.
Weeks later, on 27 August, the Adani Group formally approached the Yunus-led administration, demanding $800 million in unpaid dues for electricity supplied to the BPDB from Godda. The new administration blamed the country’s economic difficulties on costly infrastructure deals by the previous government. Yunus’s chief energy adviser, Muhammad Fouzul Kabir Khan, admitted they were facing a significant financial backlog, saying: ‘We’ve been firefighting since we took office.’
He claimed that Bangladesh’s total power-sector liabilities amounted to $3.7 billion, with $492 million owed to Adani alone, about half of what had been claimed.
The controversy continues.
Adani in Israel: bending over backwards for ‘Bibi” Netanyahu
The Adani Group was at the centre of controversy in Israel when it acquired control of the management of Haifa port, the country’s second-largest. This move was part of Adani's broader strategy to strengthen its presence in West Asia to link Asia and Europe. The deal was criticised because it coincided with escalating violence in the region.
The Indian government’s critics have argued that the Adani deal aligned with India’s shift in foreign policy under PM Modi, which moved away from its traditional support for Palestinians and closer to Israel and other conservative regimes in the Middle East. Modi was the first Prime Minister of India to visit Tel Aviv in his official capacity in July 2017.
Adani’s involvement in Israel included collaborations on assembling military hardware, such as Tavor assault rifles and Hermes drones (unmanned aerial vehicles of UAVs), which are being used in the conflict. This association has led to criticism that India is tacitly supporting Israel’s contentious ethno-nationalistic policies.
India-Israel relations were part of a broader pattern that sought strategic collaborations in West Asian countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Egypt under the framework of the Abraham Accords. These ties had strong economic dimensions, notably imports of crude oil. Of late, the most prominent concerns are about whether India’s foreign policy is becoming overly aligned with the interests of a private businessman like Adani.
In 2018, Adani Enterprises and Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest arms manufacturer, launched a joint venture called Adani Elbit Advanced Systems India Limited. This collaboration focused on producing the Hermes 900 UAV, a combat-proven drone frequently used by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). The Hermes 900, with its long flight endurance and advanced surveillance capabilities, was deployed in multiple military operations, including bombings in Gaza in 2023 and 2024.
India’s role as a supplier of explosives to Israel was revealed when a ship from Chennai in southern India that was bound for Israel was stopped off the Spanish coast in May 2024. It has been reported that a missile fragment found after the IDF’s bombings of a United Nations shelter at the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza had ‘Made in India’ and the name of a company, ‘Premier Explosives Limited’, written on it. (Adani is not linked to this company.)
Adani has partnered with Israel Weapon Industries (IWI) to establish PLR Systems in Gwalior, in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. (PLR stands for ‘precise, lethal and reliable’.) This joint venture, in which Adani holds a 51% stake, manufactures various firearms, including the Tavor and X95 assault rifles, Negev light machine guns, and Galil sniper rifles. Originally government-owned, IWI was privatised in 2005 and has expanded its presence through collaborations like the one with Adani.
Adani’s defence ambitions progressed further in 2022 when an AI-powered small-arms system maker called ARBEL was set up in collaboration with IWI and launched at the DefExpo in Gujarat. Adani and Modi (who are both from the western Indian state of Gujarat) are keen to develop the state as a centre for manufacturing weapons.
In September 2024, the Adani Group formed a joint venture with an Israeli company called Tower Semiconductor to set up a chip manufacturing plant in Maharashtra. The group plans to invest ₹83,947 crore (US $10 billion) in a project that will manufacture 40,000 wafers (a thin slice of semiconductor material that is used in fabricating integrated circuits) per month in its first phase and thereafter double its manufacturing capacity. These chips will be used in drones, cars and smart-phones.
Adani in Greece: Another port in the making?
Modi’s visit to Greece in August 2023, the first by an Indian leader in forty years, seemed at first to be like a routine diplomatic visit. However, behind the formal meetings and public statements, reports from the Greek media suggested another purpose: the way is being paved for Adani to expand its operations to Europe through Greek ports.
During Modi’s discussions with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, talks centred on the possibility of Adani acquiring stakes in ports such as Kavala, Volos and Alexandroupoli. These locations are being eyed not just for their potential to boost trade but also as crucial gateways that could facilitate India’s exports to go deeper into Europe. With India’s trade with Greece currently valued at around $2 billion, both leaders saw an opportunity to transform the country into a transit hub linking Indian businesses with European markets.
The port of Piraeus, a key Mediterranean outpost, also entered the conversation between the two heads of government. However, with China’s COSCO Shipping controlling much of the port, any Indian involvement in the port could be complicated. For Adani, these discussions align with its broader strategy of expanding its influence in the global shipping industry, complementing its dominance in India where it operates at least a dozen ports around the country. In 2024, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis visited India to finalise a deal on migration and mobility.
Coal over-invoicing scam and a strategic port project in Indonesia
The Adani Group has had significant and longstanding business associations in Indonesia, primarily in coal mining and infrastructure development. The company established its presence in the country through its subsidiary, PT Adani Global, which is engaged in mining coal and providing logistical support.
This company began operations with an ‘exploitation licence’ that was acquired in 2007. Its coal mine and port are located on the tiny island of Bunyu in the province of North Kalimantan (Borneo).
AdaniWatch has previously highlighted the negative impacts of Adani's extensive coal mining operations on Bunyu Island, particularly on the local Tidung community. The repercussions of these activities have been further detailed in a report by the Indonesian non-government organisation (NGO) called Jatam.
According to a report by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), on 9 January 2014, the bulk carrier ship MV Kalliopi L arrived at the Ennore Port in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, after a two-week journey from Indonesia. On board the ship was a cargo of 69,925 metric tonnes of coal intended for the state government’s power company, TANGEDCO, an acronym for Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation.
The paperwork for the shipment, however, took a far more convoluted route, passing through the British Virgin Islands and Singapore, both tax havens, with the declared price of the coal increasing more than three-fold to $91.91 per metric tonne during this imaginary journey. Even more curiously, the classification of the coal changed from low-grade steam coal to a high-quality variety typically sought by power generating companies.
This voyage was not an isolated incident. Documents obtained by the OCCRP and shared with the Financial Times reveal that between January and October 2014, at least 24 similar shipments arrived at Tamil Nadu’s coast. Initially billed as low-grade coal, these cargoes were allegedly sold by the Adani Group company to the state government-owned power company at three times the original price. The Group denied the allegations in general terms.
Evidence to support these allegations has come from multiple sources: invoices, banking records from various countries, investigations by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), the customs intelligence wing of the Indian government’s Ministry of Finance, leaked documents from one of Adani’s Indonesian coal suppliers, and internal records from Tamil Nadu’s power utility, TANGEDCO.
While the findings are not conclusive, they strengthen allegations that Adani Group engaged in over-invoicing. The origins of these allegations trace back to a 2012 investigation by the DRI, two years before Modi became Prime Minister in May 2014. The probe focussed on 40 companies that had allegedly artificially inflated the prices of coal imported from Indonesia. These inflated costs, the DRI alleged, were passed on to consumers, leading to higher electricity bills.
On 30 March 2016, the DRI issued a ‘look-out’ circular to 50 customs offices across India, warning them about the possibility of over-invoicing by these companies. One of the authors of this article first reported the DRI’s findings in April that year. Read it here.
PM Modi visited Indonesia on 7 September 2023 to attend the ASEAN-India and the East Asia summits. (ASEAN stands for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.) A month later, in October, Adani was already in discussions with the Indonesian government to develop Sabang Port, located near the Strait of Malacca, a crucial maritime trade route. The project included establishing a new container terminal and other transit port facilities, with an initial investment projected at nearly US $1 billion.
Restrictions on Nepal’s air routes and Adani
India is currently restricting Nepal from using high-altitude routes for aircraft citing security concerns. The Himalayan country shares a border with China. New flight paths over Indian airspace near the border are being approved with considerable caution. This has been a point of tension between Nepal and India, particularly with respect to operating new airports in Nepal, such as those in Pokhara and Bhairahawa, which were constructed with loans from China but remain economically non-viable due to India’s restrictions on the use of airspace.
Nepal’s Himal Khabar newspaper has alleged that the Modi government is exerting pressure on Kathmandu not to increase air access to Pokhara and Bhairahawa under ‘various pretexts’ until Adani is awarded deals to operate these airports, as well as an airport at Lumbini (a Buddhist cultural centre) along with the proposed airport at Nijgadh.
Officials of the governments of India and Nepal discussed these issues in June 2023. Adani Group officials visited Kathmandu in January 2024, held talks with Nepalese civil aviation authorities, and announced plans to invest in the construction of a new airport near the India-Nepal border, besides taking over the operations of the Bhairawaha International Airport and Kathmandu’s Tribhuwan International Airport. However, these plans are yet to fructify due to a subsequent recent regime change: on 15 July, K P Sharma Oli became the new Prime Minister of Nepal.
Recent reports indicate that the Adani Group is actively negotiating with developers that hold rights to build power projects in Nepal to export electricity to Bhutan and to India. This is part of the group’s plans to construct 10 gigawatts (GW) of hydroelectric capacity outside India as part of its strategy to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 – besides Nepal, the group plans to invest in hydroelectric power projects in Bhutan, Kenya, Tanzania, the Philippines and Vietnam. The group also plans to develop capacity to generate 50 GW by 2030
Adani’s contested presence ‘down under’
In 2014, during the Group of 20 (G20) summit at Sydney, Australia, various functions were organised at other cities, including Canberra – where Modi met with Gautam Adani and the then head of India's biggest bank, the public-sector State Bank of India (SBI), Arundhati Bhattacharya. At the meeting, it was announced that a memorandum of understanding had been signed between the SBI and the Adani Group for the former to extend a loan of US$1 billion to the latter for Adani's Carmichael coal-mining project. Bhattacharya described the coal-mine project as viable, but the loan never materialised.
Even then, Adani’s Carmichael coal mine project was highly controversial. Subsequently, the saga of the mine's development was marked by environmental protests, indigenous rights struggles and legal challenges. The project started in 2010 when Adani acquired the rights to develop a massive open-pit coal mine in Queensland's Galilee Basin and to build a railway to transport coal to Abbot Point Terminal for export, primarily to India.
Environmentalists raised the alarm about the project's potential to harm the Great Barrier Reef and its contribution to climate change. Groups such as Stop Adani actively campaigned against the mine. They argued that Adani’s massive extraction of coal would significantly increase Australia’s carbon footprint, directly challenging global climate goals. Concerns over water usage were another source of dissent, with local farmers and environmental campaigners arguing that the mine could drain essential groundwater resources in drought-prone areas.
The mine also faced significant opposition from the Wangan and Jagalingou people, whose traditional lands include the mining area. While some members of the Indigenous community supported the project, many opposed it, accusing Adani of ignoring their rights and cultural heritage. The legal battles of Wangan and Jagalingou people to stop the project have been documented. Despite years of litigation, the Australian government allowed Adani to proceed with the project but on a substantially smaller scale. The economic viability of the mine continues to be questioned, given global shifts towards renewable energy.
Despite the widespread opposition, including from the Bob Brown Foundation, Adani began mining coal and the first consignment was exported in December 2021. However, the mine is operating at only one sixth of the capacity originally proposed (10 million tonnes per annum rather than 60). This was a direct result of the vehement opposition to Adani's mine. In an attempt to manage the negative publicity, Adani rebranded its Australian subsidiary as Bravus Mining & Resources. This rebranding was seen by many as an effort to distance the Australian operations from the growing controversy attached to the Adani name.
The coal from Australia could potentially be used to manufacture poly-vinyl chloride (PVC) in the Group’s contentious proposed coal-to-PVC plant in Mundra, Gujarat.
Whereas the loan from the State Bank of India failed to come through, and several international lenders did not financially support the Adani coal-mining project in Queensland, in June 2024, the group secured private credit worth $333 million to refinance existing debt for its Australian coal port from the US-based Farallon Capital Management and King Street Capital Management.
