Adani Group To Invest In Sri Lanka's Bankrupt Wind Power Project

Cash-strapped Sri Lanka approved a $442 million wind power project by the Adani group on Thursday, marking the country's first significant foreign investment since it filed for bankruptcy. Adani Green Energy, a unit of controversial billionaire Gautam Adani's business empire, would build two wind farms in the north of the island, according to Sri Lanka's Board of Investment. The two facilities will start delivering electricity to the national grid "by 2025," according to a statement from the BOI. The total investment will be $442 million. The Adani Group was previously given a $700 million key port terminal project in Colombo by Sri Lanka in 2021. The majority of people believed the it was an attempt to allay New Delhi's rising anxiety over China's growing influence in the area, The Indian government has proposed the Adani company as the contractor. In Colombo Harbor, the only deep-sea container port between Dubai and Singapore, the company is constructing a 1.4-kilometer, 20-meter-deep pier immediately next to a terminal run by a Chinese company. Kanchana Wijesekera, the energy minister, reported that he met with Adani representatives on Wednesday in Colombo to finalise the wind farm deal. By December 2024, "we anticipate the power plants to be operational," he stated. The event follows last month's allegations of accounting fraud and pricing manipulation by Adani Group firms made by a US investment company, which set off a sell-off that cost the group's market value $120 billion. The organisation disputes the charges. In 2019, a Chinese company was given a $12 million contract from the Asian Development Bank to construct three wind farms on islands in the Palk Strait, which separates India and Sri Lanka. However, New Delhi objected to the proposal, and it was cancelled. China accounts for 52% of bilateral credit and is Sri Lanka's largest government lender.For Colombo to receive a $2.9 billion rescue from the International Monetary Fund, Beijing must provide financial guarantees.