"What Cost...": Supreme Court Turns Down Application In Hindenburg Case

The Supreme Court has upheld the Registry's order that refused to admit a petition seeking a direction to SEBI to submit a conclusive report in the Hindenburg case. The bench of Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan also asked how much cost should be imposed on the petitioner, Advocate Vishal Tiwari. Eventually, it dismissed the matter without imposing any cost.

In January 2023, Hindenburg published a report targeting the Adani Group and accused the conglomerate of stock manipulation. The Adani Group refuted the allegations as "malicious, mischievous and manipulative selections of publicly available information" to arrive at "predetermined conclusions for personal profiteering with wanton disregard for facts and the law".

Earlier this year, the top court had turned down petitions, including one by Mr Tiwari, seeking a Special Investigation Team (SIT) probe into the allegations against Adani Group.

The fresh ruling comes weeks after Hindenburg Research announced it was shutting down. The shock development has sparked speculation that the short seller is disbanding to avoid a possible India-US joint investigation, now that Donald Trump has taken charge.

Mr Tiwari approached the Supreme Court registrar last year, seeking a direction to markets regulator SEBI to submit its conclusive investigation report on Hindenburg's allegations against Adani Group. He also sought a probe into the short seller's allegations in its fresh report.

The Registrar rejected the application, stating that the issue had been addressed in the January ruling of the top court. Mr Tiwari then challenged the registrar's move. Today, the court upheld it.

Earlier, in July, the Supreme Court dismissed a review petition filed against its earlier verdict refusing to form any SIT to probe the matter.

In its detailed order on January 3, the Supreme Court had said reports prepared by third-party organisations such as the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and Hindenburg Research could not be regarded as "conclusive proof".

It had said the reliance placed by petitioners on newspaper articles or reports by third-party organisations "does not inspire confidence" to question SEBI's investigation.

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