The Congress on Wednesday slammed the Narendra Modi government over media reports that rules were relaxed to grant land to the Adani group for a solar project near the Pakistan border in Gujarat.

The British daily, The Guardian, on Wednesday reported that security protocols were eased by the Centre for the Adani group to build the world’s largest renewable energy plant in Gujarat’s Khavda, which is at the centre of bribery charges for which Gautam Adani and his nephew Sagar were indicted in the US last year.

“Previous national defence protocols did not allow any major construction beyond existing villages and roads up to 10km from the border with Pakistan, preventing any large-scale installation of solar panels. But documents show that the Gujarat government, which is controlled by Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), lobbied at the highest levels for the protocols to be relaxed to make land in the Rann of Kutch available for both solar and wind construction,” the report said.

“At the time that the meeting in Delhi was convened in April 2023, the 230sqkm of land closest to Pakistan had been allotted to a state-run enterprise, Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI)…. Confidential communication states that SECI was encouraged to ‘surrender’ the land at a meeting chaired by Modi’s
renewable energy minister, R.K. Singh, in early May,” the report added.

The Adani group has denied allegations of bribery and insisted that the Khavda project is compliant with all laws.

The Telegraph could not independently verify the allegations. The defence ministry did not respond to queries from this paper on the matter.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday took to X to ask Prime Minister Modi if he had bent rules to gift the plot to his “Dear Friend”.

“Is it true that you have gifted precious strategic land, just 1km near the International Border with Pakistan, to your ‘Dear Friend’ by relaxing border security rules?”
Kharge posted.

“Is it not true that your government has relaxed such rules, not just at the India-Pakistan border, but also on the land adjoining Bangladesh, China, Myanmar and Nepal, thereby jeopardising our strategic and border security? Remember, it is you who said that ‘No one entered our territory’ when 20 of the nation’s bravehearts made the supreme sacrifice fighting China in Ladakh!” he added.

Congress general secretary (organisation) K.C. Venugopal said it was “shocking” that the “BJP-run Gujarat government and the Centre held secret meetings to convince and steamroll military officials to award the project to Adani. Disregarding senior military officers, they not only made an exception for this project but for all potential ventures across India’s borders with all other countries”.

In a post on X, Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said: “Has the process of handing over all the resources of the country to the Prime Minister’s ‘friend’ reached such a point that even the border security rules are being changed?”