Adani denies U.S. investment pledge influenced dropped bribery case

Gautam Adani said his pledge to invest billions of dollars in the United States did not influence the Justice Department’s move to drop the criminal case against him.

The case began with a five-count indictment unsealed in federal court in Brooklyn on November 20, 2024, accusing Adani, his nephew Sagar Adani, Vneet S. Jaain and others of taking part in a multi-billion-dollar scheme to obtain money from U.S. investors and global financial institutions while concealing a bribery arrangement. More than $250 million in bribes were promised to Indian government officials to win solar-energy contracts tied to a project expected to generate billions of dollars in revenue. U.S. investors did not lose any money on the transactions used to bring the charges.

The Securities and Exchange Commission filed its own case the same day, charging Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani and Cyril Cabanes. Adani Green Energy Ltd. raised more than $175 million from U.S. investors in a September 2021 note offering while the alleged bribery scheme was still underway, and the offering materials contained materially false or misleading statements about anti-corruption and anti-bribery compliance.

In July 2026, the Justice Department sought dismissal because it was largely foreign, difficult to prove and outside core U.S. priorities, not because of Adani’s pledge to invest in the United States. A Justice Department official said he would have sought dismissal regardless of any investment mentions. Adani’s lawyer said the decision followed months of detailed communications, written submissions, expert testimony and presentations.