Adani-Hindenburg controversy: PIL in SC seeks probe against Nathan Anderson, his associates

New Delhi, February 3

The Adani-Hindenburg controversy reached the Supreme Court on Friday with a PIL seeking directions to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and the Ministry of Home Affairs to launch probes against founder of Hindenburg Research Nathan Anderson and his associates in India for its recent report on the Adani Group.

Filed by advocate ML Sharma, the PIL alleged that Anderson and his associates in India hatched a criminal conspiracy by short selling Adani stocks in hundreds of billion dollars before ‘concocting’ a research reportrelate d to the Adani Group in order to crash the stock market and square up their short sell position at the lowest rate.

“They secured billions of profits by butchering citizen of India. However, SEBI did not suspend trading in the stock especially qua to the Adani group of the companies and allowed short sellers to exploit innocent investors,” Sharma submitted.

He sought an enquiry to prosecute and register an FIR against Anderson and his associates under sections 420 (cheating) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC for ‘exploiting innocent investors via short selling under the garb of artificial crashing via short selling’.

Alleging that Anderson is an expert in short-selling, he sought recovery of Anderson’s alleged turnover with penalty to compensate investors.

The PIL urged the top court of declare short selling an offence—a fraud against the investors under section 420 of IPC read with section 15HA (penalty for fraudulent and unfair trade practices) of SEBI Act.

“The talk might seem tough for a relatively small five-year-old research and trading firm, but Hindenburg’s rise has been meteoric under the leadership of Anderson, a Connecticut native who experts and peers say has a gift for a type of stock trading known as short selling,” the PIL submitted.