New Delhi (PTI): Adani group stocks faced heavy drubbing during the morning trade on Thursday, with the combined market valuation of all the listed firms getting eroded by Rs 2.45 lakh crore, as billionaire Gautam Adani has been charged by US prosecutors over his role in an alleged years-long scheme to pay USD 250 million bribe to Indian officials in exchange for favourable terms for solar power contracts.
The stock of the group's flagship firm Adani Enterprises plunged 22.99 per cent, Adani Ports dived 20 per cent, Adani Energy Solutions tanked 20 per cent, Adani Green Energy plummeted 19.53 per cent and Adani Total Gas tumbled 18.14 per cent on the BSE.
Shares of Adani Power slumped 17.79 per cent, Ambuja Cements cracked 17.59 per cent, ACC fell 14.54 per cent, NDTV dropped 14.37 per cent and Adani Wilmar declined 10 per cent.
Some of the group firms also hit their lowest trading permissible limit for the day.
The combined market capitalisation (mcap) of all the ten listed group firms eroded by Rs 2,45,016.51 crore during the morning deals.
In the equity market, the BSE benchmark Sensex traded 536.89 points lower at 77,041.49 and the NSE Nifty quoted 186.75 points down at 23,331.75.
US prosecutors charged Adani, 62, his nephew Sagar and other defendants for paying over USD 250 million in bribes between 2020 and 2024 to Indian government officials to win solar energy contracts on terms that could potentially bring in more than USD 2 billion in profit.
This, they alleged, was concealed from the US banks and investors from whom the Adani group raised billions of dollars for the project.
US law allows pursuing foreign corruption allegations if they involve certain links to American investors or markets.
The Adani group did not immediately respond to requests for comments.
"The defendants orchestrated an elaborate scheme to bribe Indian government officials to secure contracts worth billions of dollars," Breon Peace, US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, which brought the case, said in a statement.
Adani, chairman of the ports-to-energy Adani Group, his nephew Sagar R Adani, who is an executive director at the conglomerate's renewable energy arm Adani Green Energy Ltd, and its former CEO Vneet Jaain were charged with securities fraud, securities fraud conspiracy and wire fraud conspiracy.
The Adanis were also charged in a US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) civil case.
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New Delhi, Jan 9: The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a batch of pleas seeking to review its October 2023 verdict declining legal sanction to same-sex marriage.
A five-judge bench of Justices B R Gavai, Surya Kant, B V Nagarathna, P S Narasimha and Dipankar Datta took up about 13 petitions related to the matter in chambers and dismissed them.
"We do not find any error apparent on the face of the record. We further find that the view expressed in both the judgements is in accordance with law and as such, no interference is warranted. Accordingly, the review petitions are dismissed," the bench said.
It said the judges have carefully gone through the judgements delivered by Justice (since retired) S Ravindra Bhat speaking for himself and for Justice (since retired) Hima Kohli as well as the concurring opinion expressed by Justice Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha, constituting the majority view.
The bench also rejected a prayer made in the review petitions for hearing in an open court.
According to practice, the review pleas are considered in chambers by the judges.
The new bench was constituted after Justice Sanjiv Khanna, the present CJI, recused from hearing the review petitions on July 10, 2024.
Notably, Justice P S Narasimha is the only member of the original Constitution bench comprising five judges which delivered the verdict, as former CJI D Y Chandrachud and Justices S K Kaul, Ravindra Bhat and Hima Kohli have retired.
A five-judge Constitution bench led by then CJI Chandrachud on October 17, 2024, refused to accord legal backing to same-sex marriages and held there was "no unqualified right" to marriage with the exception of those recognised by law.
The apex court, however, made a strong pitch for the rights of LGBTQIA++ persons so that they didn't face discrimination in accessing goods and services available to others, safe houses known as "garima greh" in all districts for shelter to members of the community facing harassment and violence, and dedicated hotlines in case of trouble.
In its judgement, the bench held transpersons in heterosexual relationships had the freedom and entitlement to marry under the existing statutory provisions.
It said an entitlement to legal recognition of the right to union, akin to marriage or civil union, or conferring legal status to the relationship could be only done through an "enacted law".
The five-judge Constitution bench delivered four separate verdicts on a batch of 21 petitions seeking legal sanction for same-sex marriages.
All five judges were unanimous in refusing the legal recognition to same-sex marriage under the Special Marriage Act and observed it was within Parliament's ambit to change the law for validating such a union.
While former CJI Chandrachud wrote a separate 247-page verdict, Justice Kaul penned a 17-page judgement where he broadly agreed with the former's views.
Justice Bhat, who authored an 89-page judgement for himself and Justice Kohli, disagreed with certain conclusions arrived at by the former CJI, including on applicability of adoption rules for such couples.
Justice Narasimha in his 13-page verdict was in complete agreement with the reasoning and conclusion of Justice Bhat.
The judges were unanimous in holding that queerness was a natural phenomenon and not an "urban or elite" notion.
In his judgement, the former CJI recorded Solicitor General Tushar Mehta's assurance of forming a committee chaired by the cabinet secretary to define and elucidate the scope of entitlements of such couples in a union.
The LGBTQIA++ rights activists, who won a major legal battle in 2018 in the Supreme Court, which decriminalised consensual gay sex, moved the apex court seeking validation of same-sex marriages and consequential reliefs such as rights to adoption, enrolment as parents in schools, opening of bank accounts and availing succession and insurance benefits.
Some of the petitioners sought the apex court to use its plenary power besides the "prestige and moral authority" to push the society to acknowledge such a union and ensure LGBTQIA++ persons led a "dignified" life like heterosexuals.