A five-count criminal indictment was unsealed in federal court in Brooklyn charging Gautam Adani, Sagar R. Adani and Vneet S. Jaain with conspiracies to commit securities and wire fraud and substantive securities fraud for their roles in a multi-billion-dollar scheme to obtain funds from US investors and global financial institutions on the basis of false and misleading statements.

The indictment also charges Ranjit Gupta and Rupesh Agarwal, former executives of a renewable-energy company with securities that had traded on the New York Stock Exchange, and Cyril Cabanes, Saurabh Agarwal and Deepak Malhotra. Here is a brief profile of these individuals named in the report.

Gautam Adani

An Indian billionaire, Gautam Adani is the founder and chairperson of the Adani Group which consists of 10 publicly listed companies and businesses spanning energy, ports, mining, gas, defence and airports.

Sagar Adani 

Nephew of Gautam Adani and the Executive Director of Adani Green Energy. He had joined the Adani Group in 2015.

Vneet Jaain 

Managing Director and CEO of Adani Green Energy Ltd. He has been associated with the Adani Group for 15 years and has spearheaded the Group’s strategy for its energy and infrastructure business. He was instrumental in setting up the Energy Network Operations Centre (ENOC) and the Project Monitoring & Control Group – two of the Group’s Centre of Excellence. Under his leadership, Adani Group has executed and set up several key energy projects. One of the world’s largest solar plants, India’s largest solar module manufacturing facility, and India’s first and most extended private owned HDVC transmission network are some of the prominent projects.

Ranjit Gupta

He was CEO of Azure Power from July 2019 to April 2022. Gupta was the co-founder of Ostro Energy, a start-up enterprise that he grew into one of the leading renewable energy companies in India with a portfolio of over 1,000 MWs. Prior to Ostro Energy, Gupta were the leading executives at other power companies, including Orange Renewables and IndiaBulls Power. He began their careers at Schlumberger, in various field and management positions.  

Rupesh Agarwal 

He was CEO of Azure Power from August 2022 and July 2023.  Prior to Azure Power, he has held leadership positions at Convergence Energy Services; Government of India owned company; Lightsource India, BDO, & EY. He was also the founder of AEM Energi & Motum, a zero-emission electric mobility company which pioneered India’s first public electric bus trials under a wet lease model for urban utilities. 

Cyril Cabanes

Cyril Cabanes, a former member of Azure Power’s Board of directors. He as citizen of Australia and France and resident of Singapore, Cabanes was the former managing director for infrastructure for a Canadian pension fund CDPQ. The Canadian pension fund was an investor in Adani subsidiary.

Saurabh Agarwal 

He was former India Managing Director of CPDQ India and Managing Director, Infrastructure, South Asia at CDPQ. He reported to Cyril Cabanes from May 2017 to July 2023. Before joining CDPQ in 2017, he spent close to a decade at Morgan Stanley, most recently as Executive Director at Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners (MSIP), a global infrastructure fund, playing a key role in evaluating, acquiring and managing investments in various types of infrastructure, including thermal, gas, wind, hydroelectricity and roads.

He also spent two years in Corporate Finance and Investment Banking Services at Morgan Stanley in Singapore, where he provided expert advice to large clients in the energy sector. Prior to this, he was a scientific researcher in supercomputer technology at IBM Research Labs and the Wipro Global R&D Center. garwal holds an MBA in Finance from the University of Michigan, a Master of Computer Science from Pennsylvania State University and a Bachelor of Computer Science and Engineering from India’s National Institute of Technology, Rourkela.

Deepak Malhotra 

Former managing director of the Canadian pension fund CDPQ.  Before joining CDPQ in 2018, Malhotra worked with International Finance Corporation (IFC), World Bank Group, where he led many debt and equity investments in the infrastructure sector. Prior to IFC, Malhotra worked with one of the leading credit rating agencies in India and in the Merchant Navy.

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