{"id":612600,"date":"2023-02-28T05:49:24","date_gmt":"2023-02-28T11:49:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.sellorbuyhomefast.com\/index.php\/2023\/02\/28\/an-emirati-businessman-recurs-in-the-adani-groups-offshore-dealings\/"},"modified":"2023-02-28T05:49:24","modified_gmt":"2023-02-28T11:49:24","slug":"an-emirati-businessman-recurs-in-the-adani-groups-offshore-dealings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2023\/02\/28\/an-emirati-businessman-recurs-in-the-adani-groups-offshore-dealings\/","title":{"rendered":"An Emirati businessman recurs in the Adani group’s offshore dealings"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Within the corporate network of India\u2019s Adani group, the names of some people pop up again and again, linked to multiple offshore entities of unclear purpose or labyrinthine structure. In the wake of Hindenburg Research\u2019s accusations<\/a><\/span> of fraud in the Adani group, these people and entities invite questions. Who are they? And, within the group, what precisely do they do?<\/p>\n

For instance, Chang Chung-Ling, a Chinese executive<\/a><\/span>, figured in the Hindenburg report as a director of several Adani firms. (One of them, a Singaporean company, came under scrutiny<\/a><\/span> by Indian authorities in 2018 for its part in a corruption scandal involving helicopter procurement.) Quartz wrote earlier about Sanjay Newatia<\/a><\/span>, an ex-banker in London who, according to the Pandora Papers, used to help a wealthy Indian lobbyist conduct offshore transactions, and who is now the sole director in 57 Adani companies registered in the UK. <\/p>\n

Another such Adani regular is Nasser Ali Shaban Ahli, a businessman who runs Al Jawda Trade & Services<\/a><\/span>, a consultancy in Dubai. Ahli\u2019s name has appeared in at least two Indian investigations into alleged money laundering by the Adani group. He also crops up in the British Virgin Islands corporate registry, as an officer in a securities investment firm linked to the Adani group. <\/p>\n

Additionally, Ahli is listed in Chinese records as the director of Beijing Basile, a company that exports industrial parts exclusively to Adani Power in India. Beijing Basile is so closely connected to the Adani group that one of its Shanghai-based employees, on LinkedIn<\/a><\/span>, says he has worked for the Adani group for the last 15 years. Yet Beijing Basile doesn\u2019t show up as a related party<\/a><\/span> in filings by Adani Power. <\/p>\n

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Screenshot: LinkedIn<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Adani group and Ahli did not respond to requests for comment from Quartz. <\/p>\n

<\/a>The Adani group\u2019s man in Dubai<\/h2>\n

In 2004 and 2005, India\u2019s Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) investigated the Adani group\u2019s flagship company, Adani Enterprises, for conducting a \u201ccircular trade\u201d in diamonds. The company was essentially importing diamonds, then exporting them to known firms overseas at an artificially inflated value, so as to make use of cheap credit from a government incentive scheme<\/a><\/span>. According to a DRI report<\/a><\/span>, a Dubai firm named Daboul Trading Company was responsible for procuring diamonds for Adani Enterprises to import into India\u2014the first arc of the circular trade. Ahli was Daboul\u2019s representative in Dubai.<\/p>\n

In the 2010s, the DRI investigated Adani Enterprises again, this time for allegedly exaggerating the invoice value of imported power equipment. (The case is still winding its way<\/a><\/span> through India\u2019s maze of tribunals and courts.) The purpose, the DRI claimed<\/a><\/span>, was to siphon funds out of the country, to an account in Mauritius. Once again, a Dubai company served as an intermediary\u2014Electrogen Infra FZE, founded in 2009 by Ahli. In March 2010, records show, Ahli transfered Electrogen\u2019s ownership to Vinod Adani, brother of the Adani group\u2019s chairman, Gautam Adani. Electrogen\u2019s parent, a company in Mauritius, had only one shareholder: Vinod Adani. <\/p>\n

Additionally, another Dubai firm named Powergen Infrastructure had, according to the DRI, awarded a power project contract to PMC Projects, an Indian company that served as a \u201cdummy firm\u201d for the Adani group. (PMC makes all its revenue from Adani contracts, but it is not named as a \u201crelated party\u201d in Adani disclosures.) In corporate registry records seen by Quartz, Powergen has three directors; two of them name Ahli as their agent. <\/p>\n

<\/a>Adani\u2019s offshore web<\/h2>\n

Ahli serves the Adanis outside Dubai as well. One firm, EZY Global, appears in Adani filings<\/a><\/span> (pdf) as a related party. Registered in the British Virgin Islands\u2014a popular tax haven\u2014EZY Global lists, among its shareholders<\/a><\/span>, Pranav Vora, a director<\/a><\/span> (pdf) of Adani Shipping. In 2011, EZY Global merged into another company, Gulf Asia Trade & Investment, according to documents from the British Virgin Islands financial commission as seen by Quartz. Ahli was a shareholder in both companies. <\/p>\n

A now-defunct company website describes Gulf Asia\u2019s activities as \u201cinvesting in long-term investments in shares, funds, bonds, and other marketable securities.\u201d The company\u2019s registered address<\/a><\/span> in the British Virgin Islands is in the care of Trident Trust. In the Pandora Papers<\/a><\/span> documents, Trident was named as one of several major providers of offshore services, such as setting up bank accounts or shell companies, or organizing tax avoidance schemes. <\/p>\n

In connection with the Adanis, Ahli appears in one other filing, and it\u2019s on the Adani group\u2019s website. In 2009-10, Adani Enterprises declared a dividend on its shares; seven years later, as per Indian law, unclaimed dividends were transferred to a state-run fund. Among the 71 investors<\/a><\/span> (pdf) who did not claim their dividends was Ahli. The filing records these investors\u2019 shareholdings. Most of those listed had shares numbering in the single or double digits. Ahli held 10,000 shares. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read More<\/a>
\n Samanth Subramanian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Within the corporate network of India\u2019s Adani group, the names of some people pop up again and again, linked to multiple offshore entities of unclear purpose or labyrinthine structure. In the wake of Hindenburg Research\u2019s accusations of fraud in the Adani group, these people and entities invite questions. Who are they? And, within the group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":612601,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28956,95159],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-612600","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-businessman","8":"category-emirati"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/612600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=612600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/612600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/612601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=612600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=612600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=612600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}