Former Quebec pension fund workers charged in U.S. in Indian government bribery case

By Joe Bongiorno, The Canadian Press on November 22, 2024.

MONTREAL – Quebec’s pension fund manager says it is co-operating with United States authorities after three former employees were indicted in federal court in Brooklyn, N.Y., in an alleged scheme to give hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes to the Indian government.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office says the trio were involved between 2020 and 2024 in a plot to pay more than US$250 million in bribes to Indian officials and to deceive investors and banks to secure contracts worth billions of dollars with a solar energy company.

Cyril Cabanes, Saurabh Agarwal and Deepak Malhotra have been charged with conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in connection with the alleged bribery scheme that also allegedly involved Indian billionaire Gautam Adani.

Adani is one of the world’s richest men and has close ties with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The attorney’s office alleges that the three former pension fund employees also conspired to obstruct a grand jury and the FBI by deleting electronic materials, withholding information and falsely denying their participation in the alleged bribery plot.

The pension fund manager, the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, says it is aware of charges against “certain former employees,” who it says were fired in 2023, adding that it won’t comment further.

Adani’s business, the Adani Group, denied the allegations as “baseless” and said they will be seeking legal recourse. None of the people charged in the case have been arrested.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 22, 2024.

– With files from The Associated Press.

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