Will Modi govt. respond to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s query on Gautam Adani, asks Congress 

In this image released by AICC on February 19, 2025, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh interacts with the media, in New Delhi.
| Photo Credit: PTI

The Congress on Wednesday (February 19, 2025) asked whether the Narendra Modi government would respond to the U.S. Securities and Exchanges Commission’s (SEC) request in the ongoing probe against the Adani group since the Prime Minister had already declared the Adani issue to be a “personal matter”.

The principal Opposition party’s comment came after the SEC told a federal judge in New York that its efforts to serve its complaint on industrialist Gautam Adani and Sagar Adani in the alleged bribery scheme are “ongoing” and that it has sent a request for assistance to the Indian authorities.

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“The U.S. Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) has just informed a New York district court that it has sought the assistance of the Modi government to serve complaints on the violations of U.S. laws by Mr. Gautam Adani and some of his colleagues. The Prime Minister has already declared the Modani issue to be a personal matter. Will he oblige the SEC?” asked Congress general secretary (communications) Jairam Ramesh.

Mr. Adani is being indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice for his role in an alleged years-long scheme to pay $250 million bribes to Indian officials in exchange for favourable solar power contracts. The Adani group has denied the allegations by the Department of Justice and the SEC and said they are “baseless”.

In a separate post on X, Mr. Ramesh claimed that the talk of reciprocal tariffs by U.S. President Donald Trump is calling into question a consumption tax like GST and wondered whether his “good friend in New Delhi” would stand up to it when national sovereignty is at stake.

“The Indian National Congress has long been calling for a GST 2.0 that will make GST a truly Good and Simple Tax, as it was intended to be. It has called for the barest minimum of rates and vastly reformed compliance rules,” Mr. Ramesh said, adding, ”Now President Trump is threatening the very existence of GST. By its very structure, GST is applicable to imports but not on exports. This has never been disputed. Now all this talk of reciprocal tariffs by the U.S. President is calling into question a consumption tax like GST”.

“WTO [World Trade Organisation] apart, national sovereignty is at stake here. Will President Trump’s good friend in New Delhi, who keeps trumpeting that he is a Vishwaguru, stand up?” asked the Congress leader.