Washington, Aug 2026 : A US federal judge has dismissed criminal fraud charges against Indian billionaire Gautam Adani and two other executives after the US Justice Department moved to abandon the prosecution.
US District Judge Nicholas Garaufis on Monday dismissed with prejudice the securities fraud, wire fraud conspiracy and securities fraud conspiracy charges against Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani and Vneet Jaain. The dismissal with prejudice means the same charges cannot be brought against them again.
The three executives had been accused of misleading US and international investors in connection with an alleged scheme to pay about $265 million in bribes to Indian officials to secure solar energy contracts. The defendants have denied wrongdoing.
Garaufis accepted a limited argument advanced by the Justice Department that certain corporate statements cited in the indictment could be viewed as vague assurances or “inactionable puffery” rather than material misrepresentations capable of supporting fraud charges.
However, the judge rejected the department’s broader criticism of the prosecution and did not endorse its characterization of the case as improperly pursued by the previous administration.
Justice Department official R. Trent McCotter had described the indictment as a “name and shame” exercise carried out under the previous administration. He also suggested that former officials had left the incoming administration with what he called “a potential quagmire of a case”.
Garaufis made clear that Monday’s decision did not amount to a finding that the allegations against the defendants were either proven or disproven. He also stressed that dismissal of the fraud-related counts should not be interpreted as an endorsement of the Justice Department’s decision to abandon those charges or as an assessment of the underlying merits of the allegations.
The ruling also did not terminate the entire five-count indictment involving all eight defendants.
The judge reserved judgment on separate foreign bribery and obstruction charges against Ranjit Gupta, Cyril Cabanes, Saurabh Agarwal, Deepak Malhotra and Rupesh Agarwal. He directed the Justice Department to provide sufficient factual support for its request to dismiss those remaining charges by August 31.
The criminal case originated with an indictment returned in October 2024 and unsealed the following month. US prosecutors had alleged that the defendants were involved in bribery, investor fraud and obstruction schemes connected with renewable energy projects in India.
The allegations had attracted significant attention because of Adani’s position as one of India’s most prominent business figures and the international nature of the renewable energy projects involved.
Adani and the other accused executives have consistently denied wrongdoing and contested the allegations.
Monday’s ruling is limited to the criminal proceedings and does not automatically resolve separate civil enforcement action initiated by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Those proceedings are legally distinct from the Justice Department’s criminal case and remain separate unless independently resolved.
The dismissal therefore marks a major development in the US criminal case against the Adani executives, while leaving other defendants and separate regulatory proceedings facing different legal outcomes.
(The content of this article is sourced from a news agency and has not been edited by the Mavericknews30 team.)
