After 14 months, Adanis agree to SEC summons despite India’s objections
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After 14 months of repeated attempts by the Indian government to block the delivery of legal summons, billionaire Gautam Adani and his nephew Sagar Adani have agreed to accept service from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) through their American lawyers, ending a protracted standoff and removing the need for the US court to consider alternative service methods.
A filing submitted on Friday to the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York confirms that the Adanis’ US counsel agreed to service on January 23, 2026, and the stipulation, submitted with the defendants’ consent, sets out the timeline for their response to the SEC’s civil fraud allegations.
Under the agreement, the Adanis have 90 days from the court’s approval either to file a formal response under Rule 12(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure or to move for dismissal under Rule 12(b), and they retain all other legal defences, including objections relating to personal jurisdiction, according to The Wire report.
The dispute arose because the Adanis reside in India, and the SEC had sought assistance from India’s Ministry of Law and Justice under The Hague Convention to serve judicial documents, but the ministry repeatedly blocked the attempts, and the agency’s requests were either rejected or left unanswered for months.
In April 2025, the ministry claimed the documents lacked required seals and signatures, which the SEC said were unnecessary under the treaty, and in December 2025, it raised a further objection, citing an internal SEC regulation, which the regulator dismissed as baseless.
The repeated roadblocks prompted the SEC to file a motion in January 2026 asking the court to allow service directly through the Adanis’ US lawyers or by email, and just two days later, the defendants’ counsel agreed to accept service, effectively bypassing the treaty process.
The Adanis are represented by three prominent US law firms — Sullivan & Cromwell, Nixon Peabody and Hecker Fink — and the SEC has filed civil fraud charges alleging that Gautam and Sagar Adani orchestrated a bribery scheme involving hundreds of millions of dollars to secure solar energy contracts.
The charges relate to a September 2021 bond offering by Adani Green Energy that raised over $175 million from US investors, and federal prosecutors filed parallel criminal charges, including securities fraud and wire fraud conspiracy, which are being pursued separately.
The Adani Group has consistently denied the allegations and stated that it will exhaust all legal remedies, and the latest development marks a key step in advancing the SEC’s enforcement action without further procedural delays.