Opposition parties demanded the suspension of regular parliament proceedings on Thursday to discuss the risk to Indian investors from the continued slide in shares of the Adani Group following fraud claims by US short-seller Hindenburg Research.
Leaders of several opposition parties met in the parliament complex in the morning to whack out a joint strategy to take on the central government during the Budget Session, and decided to seek a discussion on the Adani Group issue.
The meeting in the chambers of the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, had leaders of 13 parties, including the Trinamool Congress, Aam Aadmi Party and Samajwadi Party, DMK, Janata Dal-United, and Left.
Mr Kharge, the Congress chief, AAP leader Sanjay Singh and K Keshava Rao, an MP from Telangana Chief Minister KCR’s party Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) filed a notice for the discussing the Adani stock crash in the Rajya Sabha.
Congress whip in Lok Sabha Manickam Tagore filed a similar adjournment motion in the lower house.
Mr Kharge, in his motion, said, “This House do suspend Zero Hour and relevant rules relating to Question Hour and other businesses of the day to discuss the issue of investment by LIC (Life Insurance Corporation of India), public sector banks and financial institutions in companies losing market value, endangering the hard-earned savings of crores of Indians.”
Giving notice under the same rule seeking suspension of usual parliament business, the BRS said the Hindenburg report “exposes the dangers to which the Indian people and economy are subjected to” and merit immediate discussion.
Since the report came out last week, Adani’s finance chief has called the Hindenburg report a “malicious combination of selective misinformation and stale, baseless and discredited allegations that have been tested and rejected by India’s highest courts”.
On Sunday, the firm issued a 413-page statement that it said rebutted all of Hindenburg’s claims, calling it an attack on the “growth story and ambition of India”.
Hindenburg said Adani’s statement failed to answer most of the questions raised in its report.
On Thursday, hours after the group cancelled a sale of shares in a Follow on Public Offer or FPO, its founder Gautam Adani released a video message to investors insisting that the fundamentals of his group are “strong” and that its record on paying back debt was “impeccable”.
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