In a hugely damaging development, India’s richest businessman and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s close billionaire friend, Gautam Adani, lost four places in the global rich list as his company, Adani Enterprises lost $9 billion in a single day. This was after US-based Hindenburg Research published its report raising serious questions on the Adani Group’s debt levels and the use of tax havens in Mauritius, Caribbean Island and Singapore among others. The Adani Group trended prominently on social media as the report by Hindenburg Research dominated news coverage of the most credible media outlets globally. But, some netizens were surprised to see the muted response of India’s NDTV, a media platform that Adani recently acquired. Angry social media users called NDTV’s silence ‘criminal’ prompting the media platform to publish a few stories with a carefully chosen headlines.
Titled as ‘How The World’s 3rd Richest Man Is Pulling The Largest Con In Corporate History’, the two-year-long investigation by Hindenburg Research was published just two days before the Adani Group was planning to start a huge stock market fundraising drive. Adani was accused of ‘brazen stock manipulation’, ‘accounting fraud’and ‘money laundering.’
The Adani Group threatened legal action against Hindenburg Research as it termed the allegations as a ‘malicious combination of selective misinformation and stale, baseless and discredited allegations.’ The US-based platform welcomed the threats and urged the Adani Group to initiate legal proceedings in America.
The allegations against Adani sent shockwaves in the stock market, which experienced a bloodbath on Friday, wiping off $9bn of the Adani Group’s fortune.
The development evoked angry reactions from India’s opposition parties. Randeep Surjewala of the Congress tweeted, “#SBI & other Banks exposure in Adani Group is ₹81,200 CR. Add, #LIC ‘s invest value in Adani is ₹77,000 CR & post #Hindenburg report, it has lost ₹23,500 CR. Anywhere else, PM would be asked to explain. FM would be sacked. A full investigation would have been ordered.”
NEW FROM US:
Adani Group – How The World’s 3rd Richest Man Is Pulling The Largest Con In Corporate Historyhttps://t.co/JkZFt60V7f
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— Hindenburg Research (@HindenburgRes) January 25, 2023
Similar reaction followed from social media users with most slamming NDTV for its questionable integrity by first ignoring the investigation carried out by the US-based platform against its owner.
Any big media house actively reporting Adani fiasco as they usually do with every other news?
With magnitude of numbers mentioned media should have already gone crazy!
Looks like investments on NDTV are reaping benefits now!#AdaniGroup #hindenburgresearch
— Pavan Kamat (@PavanKamat24) January 25, 2023
Any idea why NDTV is not reporting on the #hindenburgresearch expose on Adani??? 😇
— Priyaa Yadav (@PriyaaReturnz) January 26, 2023
#NDTV has not shown #Hindenburgresearch till now !!
— Dr Aman Dholewal (@DrAmanDholewal) January 27, 2023
@ndtv It has been 3 days since Hindenburg research was published, the market is bleeding, but NDTV
has observed a criminal silence.
Where are @Nidhi @VishnuNDTV @SreenivasanJain ?? Is the money obscure the journalism??— Vilas Dholam (@VilasDholam1) January 27, 2023
After the Adani Group’s shares plunged in the stock marker, Gautam Adani was dislodged as the world’s third richest man to the seventh position.