SEBI v. Adani Ports and SEZ Ltd and others (Adicorp loan routing, 2025)

Dismissed

✓ Checked against the primary document on October 8, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, in a single reading of the order; an independent second reading of 60 SEBI records agreed on every field for 56, the four misses being penalty amounts. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

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A SEBI whole-time member examined a January 2023 short-seller report claiming Adani Group money was routed through Adicorp Enterprises to Adani Power without being disclosed as related-party dealing. In September 2025 the order held that the loans were not related-party transactions as the rules then stood, found no fraud, and closed the case without any directions.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

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Disgorgement

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Prejudgment interest

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Total relief

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Alleged gain

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A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

The final order of 18 September 2025 was passed by a SEBI whole-time member. It follows a report published on 24 January 2023 by the short seller Hindenburg Research, which alleged that Adicorp Enterprises, a modestly sized company, had been used to carry funds from Adani Group companies to the listed Adani Power. The five noticees were Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Limited, Adani Power Limited, Adicorp, Gautam Adani and Rajesh Adani.

SEBI's show-cause notice alleged that in financial years 2012-13 to 2018-19 the ports company transferred about Rs 1,282 crore to Adicorp, which passed the same sums to Adani Power within a day or two, and that the money later returned the same way with interest. The notice said these dealings were really related-party transactions that the listed companies failed to disclose, that audit committee approvals were skipped, that the two men signed incorrect financial certifications, and that the arrangement was a device or artifice in breach of Section 12A of the SEBI Act and Regulations 3 and 4 of the PFUTP Regulations.

The order rejects the central premise. It reads the listing agreement and the LODR Regulations as they stood at the time as not covering dealings between a listed company and an unrelated party, and treats the 2021 amendment, which widened the definition and took effect prospectively from April 2022, as confirming that. It also relies on the Supreme Court-appointed expert committee's reading and on earlier SEBI precedent. Without a related-party classification, the further allegations of incorrect disclosure, missing approvals and false certification fell with it.

On the fraud charge the order holds additionally that the transactions could not be treated as manipulative or fraudulent, because there was no allegation of siphoning or diversion, the money had come back with interest before the investigation began, and nothing apart from the related-party point was cited as evidence of fraud. It therefore found the allegations not established, declined to consider penalties, and disposed of the proceedings against all five noticees without any direction.

The record does not show whether SEBI or anyone else appealed. The order reaches its result on how the pre-2022 definition applied, not on a finding that the disclosures were adequate in a wider sense. It describes no criminal case.

This library tags the matter as misleading issuer disclosure. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's.

For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above. This page deliberately summarises the structured record rather than reproducing the order.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Misleading issuer disclosure — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2025-09-18 SEBI whole-time member final order disposing of the proceedings

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• SEBI order

The linked release is published by the issuing regulator under its own terms. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Same matter

The library links these 2 records because they appear to concern one matter: the same lead defendant, an overlapping technique tag and close filing dates, or a shared court docket or a release that cites the other. Records are listed by date filed.

This grouping is the library's, made by matching names, techniques, dates and citations when the site is built. It is not the regulator's or a court's determination that the records are one case, and it errs towards missing a link rather than making a false one.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added October 8, 2026. submit a correction.