Adani deal: Key flaws flagged by review committee
The deal raised red flags because of three fundamental flaws.
The national review committee probing power sector agreements signed under the ousted Awami League regime has gathered evidence strong enough for Bangladesh to initiate international legal proceedings against Adani Power Limited, committee members told The Business Standard yesterday (27 January).
Here is why the deal raised red flags:
The committee formally disclosed its findings at a press briefing the day before.
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There, committee member Mushtaq Husain Khan, an economist at the University of London, identified three fundamental flaws in the Adani agreement: site selection, power pricing and contractual terms.
The coal-fired plant was initially proposed for Moheshkhali in Cox's Bazar or Godda in India's Jharkhand state, but without any documented justification, it was ultimately built in Godda, he said.
"There was no technical discussion, documentation or justification for the tariff," Mushtaq added, questioning why Bangladesh should pay taxes on electricity generated from a plant located in India.
He also noted that Bangladesh would bear the financial risk if the plant were to be damaged by political unrest inside India.
"Taking all these factors together, we concluded that the deal could only have been signed through corruption; there is no other plausible explanation," he said.
The Bangladesh Power Development Board and Adani Power Limited signed the 25-year power purchase agreement in November 2017 to import 1,496MW of electricity from Adani's 1,600MW coal-fired plant in Jharkhand.
The first 800MW unit began operations in April 2023.
