New Delhi:

Jai Anant Dehadrai, the lawyer who last year accused a Trinamool MP of accepting bribes to ‘target’ the Adani Group, reacted Thursday to news Hindenburg Research – the United States-based short seller that alleged, with no apparent evidence, financial impropriety by the business giant – will be disbanded.

In a lengthy post on X this morning, Mr Dehadrai also linked Hindenburg shutting down to the return of Donald Trump as the US President on January 20; earlier an influential member of Mr Trump’s party had called out a decision by the outgoing government, led by Joe Biden, to probe certain Adani firms.

Mr Dehadrai also hit out at the Trinamool leader – labelling the person a “crooked puppet who tried spinning a conspiracy-theory (around Hindenburg’s allegations), particularly against the Prime Minister (Narendra Modi)”, and demanded the MP be “subjected to rigorous custodial inquiry”.

“With Hindenburg shutting down mere days before Trump takes office, the message couldn’t be clearer: the attacks on Prime Minister Modi, the Adani Group, and India’s stock market regulator (the Securities and Exchange Board of India) were not just about profit – they were part of a calculated and synchronised effort to sow instability in India,” Mr Dehadrai alleged.

“But here’s where it gets truly interesting. With (Hindenburg founder) Nate Anderson now fully exposed and in retreat – who were the crooked puppets in India who tried spinning a conspiracy-theory around the above mentioned entities?”

With Hindenburg shutting down mere days before Trump takes office, the message couldn’t be clearer: the attacks on Prime Minister Modi @narendramodi, the Adani Group @gautam_adani, and India’s stock market regulator @SEBI_India were not just about profit—they were part of a…

— Jai Anant Dehadrai (@jai_a_dehadrai) January 16, 2025

“Will the former MP who orchestrated many of these attacks in India, particularly against the Prime Minister, be fully investigated and subjected to a rigorous custodial inquiry and global financial audit?” he continued, claiming, “The money-trail from this individual will lead to some of the most notorious criminal entities to have ever existed – worldwide.”

Earlier today, Mr Anderson, in a note on Hindenburg’s website, said the company would be shut down after completion of pending projects. The announcement comes days before Mr Trump is to take office. However, Mr Anderson claimed no threat in the decision to close his firm.

READ | US Short Seller Hindenburg, Which Targeted Adani Group, To Shut

In 2022, Hindenburg Research made multiple allegations of financial impropriety by the Adani Group. The charges were firmly and completely denied by the company, which trashed them as “nothing but lies” and called them “calculated attacks on India and the Indian economy”.

READ | Adani Group Refutes Hindenburg Allegations, Calls It “Attack On India”

Later the Supreme Court gave both the Adani Group and SEBI a clean chit.

READ | Supreme Court Backs Clean Chit To Adani Group In Hindenburg Row

The allegations were recycled in August last year.

They were once again firmly dismissed; the business behemoth’s chairman, Gautam Adani, slammed the “dual assault targeting our financial stability and pulling us into a political storm”. “It was a calculated move,” he said.

READ | Adani Group, SEBI Chief, Industry Leaders Slam “Discredited” Hindenburg

Hindenburg also targeted SEBI chief Madhavi Puri Buch and her husband, both of whom called the allegations an “attempt at character assassination”. This was after the markets’ regulator flagged what it said were violations by Hindenburg and its sole owner, Mr Anderson.

NDTV is now available on WhatsApp channels. Click on the link to get all the latest updates from NDTV on your chat.

(Disclaimer: New Delhi Television is a subsidiary of AMG Media Networks Limited, an Adani Group Company.)

Mumbai:

Adani Group Chairman Gautam Adani at an event in Mumbai explained to the audience how the conglomerate countered false allegations in the Hindenburg matter, came out stronger, and bounced back in no time.

“As far as my first reaction was concerned – when the news first came, I could see that the published material was all old allegations, which had been recycled in a different way. Such attacks were not new – and I felt that, like many earlier attacks on us, this too will pass quickly. In fact, it was business as usual,” Mr Adani said.

Mr Adani, however, acknowledge it was a sophisticated form of attack on the conglomerate.

“The Hindenburg attack on Adani was the world’s biggest attack on a corporate. I also have no hesitation in saying that this attack was a unique two-dimensional attack, compared to typical short-seller attacks which are one-dimensional. This attack on us not only played out in the financial market but also played out in the political theatre. Both played out in conjunction, complementing and reinforcing each other, ably supported by a section of the media, both in India and abroad,” Mr Adani said.

He said the Adani Group “initially grossly underestimated the impact of this report”.

“However, very soon, we understood the conspiracy and its depth. With no precedence to handle a crisis of this nature and magnitude, we evolved our own contra-strategy to handle it – and the rest, as they say, is history,” he said.

Explaining the steps the conglomerate took following the short-seller’s attack, Mr Adani said the first step was to return the proceeds of the follow-on public offer (FPO) of Rs 20,000 crore on “moral grounds”.

The Adani Group then created a strong war-chest of cash of Rs 70,000 crore, prepaid Rs 17,500 crore of margin-linked financing, and insulated CEOs and executives from the noise. “I told them to tighten their belt and focus on business,” Mr Adani said.

The conglomerate further maintained the growth momentum and continued with expansion and new projects like Khavda, Dharavi, copper smelter – just to name a few. It created a war-room and answered all questions, Mr Adani said, adding they executed an extensive engagement programme with all their stakeholders.

The two key takeaways, according to Mr Adani, are cash is king, and the importance of engagement and strong communications with all stakeholders.

“Our biggest learning was that doing a good job is not enough – we must tell our story too. We need to communicate more – and communicate timely and more effectively,” Mr Adani said.

“I would also like to conclude by sharing that, in this whole Hindenburg affair, what pained me the most was that many retail shareholders lost money. I feel extremely bad for them as they lost money for no reason. There never was any truth in all those allegations – and this was later validated when our companies regained their financial value in the capital markets,” the Adani Group Chairman said.

(Disclaimer: New Delhi Television is a subsidiary of AMG Media Networks Limited, an Adani Group Company.)