Adani case: Journalist Ravi Nair gets one-month stay on sentence. Here’s a look at his posts that led to conviction

The magistrate court in Mansa, Gandhinagar, that had convicted journalist Ravi Nair in a criminal defamation case, granted a one-month stay on the sentence on Friday, February 13.

The court headed by first class judicial magistrate Damini Dixit had sentenced Ravi Nair to one year imprisonment and a fine of Rs 5000 on February 10 in a case filed by the Adani group in 2021. The Gautam Adani-led entity alleged that Nair had indulged in criminal defamation against the multinational conglomerate.

Hours after the conviction, Nair had shared a cryptic yet significant post on X, in which he said, “Hum Dekhenge” (We shall see).

Hum dekhenge 🦾

— Ravi Nair (@t_d_h_nair) February 10, 2026

Friday’s court order gives Nair and his legal team a month’s time to move to a higher court to challenge the conviction. One of Nair’s advocates, Vedant Rajyaguru, told Alt News, “Ravi Nair appeared before the Magistrate on Friday, and got 30 days stay on the earlier verdict, till March 10. We are planning to appeal before a higher court as soon as possible.”

What was Nair’s Offence?

The court had found Ravi Nair guilty under section 499 and punishable under section 500 of the Indian Penal Code. Section 500 of the IPC provides for up to two years of imprisonment for criminal defamation.

According to the legal documents of this case accessed by Alt News, the Adani Enterprise Limited had filed the criminal defamation suit against Ravi Nair on September 3, 2021. Adani group alleged that Nair had posted a series of tweets from his Twitter (currently X) account, from October 2020 till July 2021, involving the enterprise, which were ‘scandalous’ , ‘false’, ‘misleading’, ‘derogatory’ and ‘defamatory’ in nature.

The Adani Group listed 17 tweets by Ravi Nair in their complaint, which according to them, seriously tarnished the image of the company.

The charge said, “Nair had published and circulated defamatory articles on a website, operating under the domain name, www.adaniwatch.org”.

Adani Enterprise Limited alleged, the cumulative effect of those tweets was to portray the Adani group as beneficiaries of ‘undue political patronage’, ‘manipulators of laws and policies’, and ‘entities engaged in unethical, illegal or improper business practices’. The complainant also accused Ravi Nair of putting forward a few posts, which suggested that, ‘environmental laws were tweaked or diluted to facilitate Adani backed projects, that public assets such as ports and airports were transferred to Adani entities through misuse of governmental agencies, and that the Adani group enjoys preferential treatment from the central government’.

The Group also said in their accusation that a few of Ravi Nair’s tweets ‘attribute corruption, coercive land acquisition, financial impropriety, regulatory violation, and even human rights abuses to the Adani Group’. It was mentioned before the court by the  Adani group that some of the tweets in question suggested that the Adani group was financially over-leveraged, possessed a systemic risk to public sector banks or was linked with fugitives and offshore entities.

‘Allegations Made without Verification’

According to the Adani Group, the allegations were made without verification, ‘authoritative finding’ or factual basis and are presented in a manner calculated to arouse suspicion, distrust and adverse public opinion against the company. They also alleged that due to Ravi Nair’s such tweets, the Adani Group suffered ‘serious injury to its reputation and goodwill’ , and was ‘compelled’ to explain and clarify the allegations to joint venture partners, foreign institutions, investors, bankers, shareholders, regulatory authorities, employees and other stakeholders across the globe.

In Nair’s defence, his lawyers pleaded that the tweets were in ‘good faith as they were based on research done from articles already available in the public domain. They argued that since the accused didn’t come up with the accusations on his own, and he merely shared those links, and as the authors of the mentioned articles haven’t been implicated in the trial, so Ravi Nair should also be acquitted from the charges.

His lawyers also argued that the very foundation of defamation was missing from this case. However, it fell short, and the court convicted Nair on the charge of criminal defamation.

The Problematic X Posts

Alt News was able to find 16 of the 17 tweets flagged by Adani Enterprises Limited and submitted before the court. At the time of this article being written, all the 16 X posts are live and accessible.

The first tweet of Nair mentioned on the list, as submitted to the court, was from November 5, 2020.

In that tweet, Nair shared a Guardian article with the headline: Crooked not courageous: Adani renames Australian group Bravus, mistaking it for ‘brave’. In caption, he wrote, “Adani Australia announced on Thursday that it would change the name of its Australian operation to Latin word “Bravus”. Latin experts say the meaning of the word is “crooked” or “mercenary”. Fits well?”

On December 24, 2020, Nair shared another news article link by the Sri Lankan independent news platform, Newsfirst, with the following caption: Indian Govt has proposed the name of the Adani Group as an investor for the development of ECT of Colombo port : Rohitha Abeygunawardena, Sri Lankan Minister of Ports and Shipping Looks like Modi govt managing the Business Development of Adani group.

According to the Adani Group, four of Nair’s tweets from October 2020 fell under the bracket of criminal defamation.

On October 7, 2020, while sharing a link of an article published on Narendra Modi’s website, he wrote, When it comes to Natural Gas, there are two Major private players in India. Mukesh Ambani wants to be the number one LPG supplier in India and Gautam Adani wants to be numero uno of the the CNG market. What a transparent move! Wah wah.

On October 10, 2020, Nair shared a News18 post with the following caption: Adani has to take over three airports in November.

On October 11, 2020, he shared a Newsclick article titled Maharashtra; Fears surrounding the last government port in line to be privatized. Nair wrote in his post, “Govt owned Jawahralal Nehru Port Trust in Maharashtra is India’s largest and busiest port. It has more than 8,000 acres of land. 1000s of workers are dependent on it. It is profitable. Bankrupt Modi govt is trying to privatize it to raise money Adani?”

On October 20, 2020, he shared an article from the Adaniwatch website and remakred, “Modi government tweaked environmental laws to facilitate an Adani-backed project get clearance.”

On December 14, 2020, Nair again shared an article from Adaniwatch, which had the following headline: Senator tables dossier on Adani’s atrocious international record. He topped up this post with the following post: “Australian Senator Nick McKim says Adani group seized land from villagers using coercion and underhand tactics for its Godda thermal power station in Jharkhand. Modi govt declared this power station as an SEZ for Adani to save millions in taxes.”

On November 26, 2020, Nair shared an opinion piece by the Times of India, with the headline: Modi’s promise of transparency and how Adani’s DHFL googly might derail It. Nair’s caption for sharing this article was: “When it comes to Adani group, govt knows how to bend laws and rules to fit in PM Modi’s favourite crony. Adani group is a bubble. It will burst sooner than later and a lot of public sector banks and scores of small investors will be doomed.”

On November 24, 2020, he shared a Times of India article link and wrote: RBI’s proposal to allow large corporates to set up banks will help highly indebted and politically connected business houses to push for licenses. It is another move to help Large borrowers like Adani and Ambani.

On January 3, 2021, He shared the link to a Caravan Magazine article titled: Why SBI is under the spotlight to reject a billion-dollar loan to Adani’s Australia mine.

While sharing it, Nair wrote on X, “In early December, three major global financial institutions – BlackRock, Amundi and Storebrand ASA warned the SBI against extending a loan of Rs 5,000 crore to fund the Adani Group’s controversial Carmichael coal mine in Australia. Adani group’s Australian operations involved “a labyrinth of trusts interposed between private companies and Indian stock market-listed companies with ties to, and in some cases ownership in tax havens stretching from Singapore to Mauritius, on to the Cayman Islands and the BVI.”

On January 15, 2021, Nair posted a link to an associates times article which is currently not accessible. The caption for this post was: “US might impose sanctions on Ambani, Adani business groups under the Magnitsky Act. An official source in Joe-Biden’s administration The Magnitsky Act is a US law that directs at human rights abusers and crooked, unethical officials worldwide.”

On that particular day, he shared four X posts regarding the Adani group, and all of them were listed before the court.

The second tweet of the day was a mix of two articles, one by the Indian Express, and another from Newsclick. The Newsclick article was authored by Ravi Nair himself, and it’s headline was: How Modi Bypassed Norms to Try and Enable Adani’s Entry into Airport Business. The Indian Express article’s headline was: Finance Ministry and Niti Aayog had raised red flags before Adani’s clean sweep of six airports.

In caption, Nair wrote, “Hello @IndianExpress, Finance Ministry and Niti Aayog’s opposition to all the airports going to one party was and the PM appointed EGoS over ruling that opposition was exposed by me way back in May 2019. Link attached for your ref.”

The third tweet from January 15, 2021 was also a Newsclick article: How Adani will become India’s largest private airport operator. The caption said, “How govt used central agencies for the benefit of Adani to take over the Mumbai airport was exposed way back in the starting of September 2020 by me and @paranjoygt”.

In the last tweet from January 15, 2021, Nair had shared the link of a YouTube video by the Newsclick. The caption was as follows: “If farmers are questioning Modi govt’s Adani Ambani welfare policies, why the godi media is getting upset about it and labelling farmers terrorists and Khalistanis? @abhisar_sharma is asking pertinent questions. Watch the video.”

On July 29, 2021, the journalist posted an Adaniwatch article link and wrote, “The ultimate beneficiary of 5 FPIs that have heavily invested in the Adani Group companies is MIH International Ltd, registered in the British Virgin Islands. MIH is under ED lens for its close connection with fugitives Sandesaras and Jatin Mehta.”

On July 30, 2021, sharing another Adaniwatch article link, he posted a thread. It said, “Gudami International, a Singapore registered entity, was a major investor in the Adani group for a long time. The customs department found out that Vinod Adani and Adani employees were directors of the company. n 2018, the ED had said, Gudami International was also linked to some of the accused in the alleged AgustaWestland bribery scandal and was used to launder the bribe. In 2020, Gudami was mysteriously struck off from the register of companies in Singapore. Elara India Opportunities Fund and Vespera Fund Limited are subsidiaries of Elara Capital, registered in the UK. ICIJ Paradise Papers shows the two directors of Elara was linked to different tax-havens. Their first successful fundraising was for fugitive Sandesaras. Lord Meghnad Desai is an additional director of Elara Capital. Whether Desai has any knowledge about EIOF and Vespera’s real beneficial owners is not known. Or do the promoters of Elara think Desai’s name in the board of directors will cover up the funds’ dubious nature? (4/4)

‘Derogatory, Yes, Not Defamatory’; ‘Order not Acceptable’

Speaking to the Alt News, journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, who has collaborated extensively with Ravi Nair for over a decade to produce investigative reports on the Adani Group, said, “With all due respect to the magistrate and the judicial system of India, I am humbly of the view, that the verdict given against my collaborator, associate and independent investigative journalist Ravi Nair should not have been given.”

“I think the X posts that were found derogatory were not defamatory, and largely sought to disseminate information that was already in the public domain. Ravi’s social media posts should be seen as fair comment and not as defamatorily. Also, the judgement of the honorable magistrate appears to reinforce the view that defamation should be decriminalized,” Guha Thakurta added.

Advocate Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya made a similar observation. “The verdict against Ravi Nair is not acceptable in my opinion. The court should have gone after the sources of the alleged defamatory statements, in this case the already published articles, and verify their authenticity. Instead Ravi Nair was targeted for just sharing them,” he said.

He further said, “when a journalist such as Mr Nair propagated the findings of the said articles, it increased the social acceptance of those articles and the information they tried to convey. Naturally, that hurt the Adani Group’s sentiments and interest, and now they are going after Nair.”

In September 2025, a Delhi court had stayed the ex parte order restraining Ravi Nair, Abir Dasgupta, Ayaskant Das and Ayush Joshi from publishing reports ‘defaming’ the Adani Enterprise Limited. District judge Ashish Aggarwal of the Rohini court said that the ex-parte interim injunction of September 6 passed by senior civil judge Anuj Kumar Singh of the Rohini Courts directing the journalists to remove articles and social media posts was ‘unacceptable’ since it had been given without the journalists having an opportunity of hearing.