The Congress has given a new interpretation to the allegations of “loot” against the Adani group, arguing that the Prime Minister was facilitating “theft” from the people while contemptuously rejecting the attempts by other parties to mitigate the pain of the poor by describing it as “revdi” (freebies) culture.

Amidst fresh allegations of the Adanis making undue profits by inflating the price of imported coal, Congress communications chief Jairam Ramesh said: “Where do these projects come from? Prime Minister Narendra Modi, of course. India’s citizens are paying for inflated coal and power-equipment costs and it is their money that is being siphoned out to benefit the Prime Minister.”

Calling the Adani affairs the biggest scam in independent India, Ramesh said: “This amounts to outright theft from the people of India. And when the Congress tries to mitigate the pain created by the Modi government with welfare schemes, such as the guarantee programmes implemented in Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh and those promised in Madhya Pradesh and Telangana, the Prime Minister mocks it as revdi.”

The Congress leader added: “First he inflicts pain in your life to help his billionaire friends and then he attacks those who try to ease your pain. Recall that Adani was profiteering at a time when crores of Indians were reeling from Covid and economic distress, drawing down their hard-earned savings to survive as their pockets were being picked.”

The Prime Minister has not answered even one of the hundred questions asked by the Congress on the Adani affair.

Recalling how Adani’s wealth grew, Ramesh said: “With the Prime Minister’s help, these funds are deployed to build monopolies in airports, ports, defence and many other sectors. With PM Modi’s help, the ED, CBI and the income tax department are used to manage the competition and ensure that assets go into Adani’s hands. With the PM’s help, Adani also gets contracts in friendly neighbouring countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. In return, the BJP is kept flush with electoral bond funds which allows it to buy MLAs at will and break Opposition parties.”

Arguing that the key point is that Adani and the Prime Minister are taking money from the people, Ramesh described the alleged nexus by saying: “It combines greed and heartlessness with a cold contempt for the people of India. It is based on the conviction that there is no scam that cannot be ‘managed’ and that there is no issue that cannot be diverted from. But the Shahenshah is mistaken. India will not be captured by Modani. The people of India will answer in 2024.”

Referring to various contracts that the Congress alleged were handed over to Adani because of Modi’s influence, Ramesh said: “Electricity contracts allow high capital costs and the price of fuel to be passed on to consumers via higher prices. Now it has become clear why electricity prices have spiralled so much. For example, the Gujarat state government has admitted in writing that, between 2021 and 2022, the price of electricity bought from Adani Power rose by 102 per cent. The story is similar in other states. In Jharkhand, a state government auditor stated in writing on May 12, 2017, that regulatory changes relating to Adani’s Godda power plant amounted to ‘preferential treatment’ and would give the company ‘undue benefits’ of Rs 7,410 crore.”

Ramesh alleged that Modi has relied “on PR stunts, headline management and rhetoric to divert people’s attention from the wholesale loot of national wealth being carried out by him and his close friends”.

“But the truth will not be hidden. New revelations about a shadowy network of Adani confidantes engaging in round-tripping, money laundering and brazen violations of Sebi laws have exposed how the Prime Minister and his cronies are enriching themselves and the BJP at the expense of India’s poor and middle class. This is not a metaphorical loot, it is literally theft from the pockets of crores of Indians.”

The Congress leader said the latest revelations in the Financial Times newspaper had shown how credible the allegations made by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) were. “The DRI had found evidence that the Adani group was siphoning out thousands of crores of rupees from India by over-invoicing coal imports. The Prime Minister may have subsequently ‘managed’ the investigation and neutered the country’s investigative agencies, but the truth has come out nonetheless,” he added.

The Financial Times studied 30 Adani coal shipments between 2019 and 2021 amounting to 3.1 million tonnes. It found that the total cost declared in Indonesia, including shipping and insurance, was $142 mn (Rs 1,037 crore) while the value declared to Indian customs was $215 mn (Rs 1,570 crore). That amounts to a 52 per cent profit margin, or the alleged siphoning out of Rs 533 crore in only 30 shipments.