Bangladesh pays 4.0-5.0 US cents per unit extra to India's Adani conglomerate which costs it US$400-500 million annually for 'unfair' power-purchase agreement (PPA), an official probe reveals.
And the country could lose an aggregate sum of US$10 billion as a consequence over the 25-year contract entered into with 1,496-megawatt Adani power plant across the border, the national committee on finding suspected anomalies in the power deals estimates.
"We have found substantial evidence based on which the government can cancel the PPA with Adani and seek compensation," the committee members said Sunday at a press briefing at Bidyut Bhaban in Dhaka.
The evidences include bank records, transaction dates, and foreign travel documents of officials.
"Whistleblower accounts suggest the contracts were signed under direct orders from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's office, implicating senior officials," committee members alleged.
The briefing was organised for submitting the final report by the national committee formed after the fall of the past government in a student-mass uprising in 2024.
"We hope that the government will take steps immediately before the contract gets affirmed," says the committee.
The panel got evidence that those involved with the agreement was bribed at least several million US dollars, they said.
High-ups of the previous Awami League government were also involved with the process of awarding the Adani power-plant deal, the committee members said.
Meanwhile, a Financial Times (FT) reports that a spokesperson for Adani Power said the company had not been approached by the committee and the review had not been made available ahead of publication.
They said that Adani Power supplied "reliable, high-quality and amongst the most competitively priced (amongst similar imported coal-based plants) power".
Power supplies from Adani's plant to Bangladesh have contributed to tense relations between Dhaka and New Delhi. Adani, the influential conglomerate chaired by politically connected billionaire Gautam Adani, started cutting electricity to Bangladesh at the end of 2024 due to a backlog of overdue payments.
The situation has since stabilised and Adani Power said in August that it was receiving regular payments from Bangladesh.
"We have continued to honour our supply commitment despite large receivables, when many other generators have cut back or even stopped," said the spokesperson.
Summit Group said the allegations were "entirely speculative and without merit", adding that its Meghnaghat plant had been ranked the third least expensive power plant to dispatch energy by the Bangladesh Power Development Board last year.
The project is backed by "international stakeholders and lenders with extremely strong due diligence and governance requirements", it said.
S Alam Group, Reliance Power and Jera did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Reliance Power, part of Anil Ambani's Reliance Group, is separate from his older brother Mukesh's Reliance Industries.
The probe committee, however, cautions that the countrymen will have to bear the pinch of the legal fight with the Indian company as canceling or challenging major deals could trigger temporary electricity shortages, including severe load-shedding if Adani halts supply.
The committee stressed the need for public support, urging citizens to endure short-term hardship to secure long-term benefits.
The committee also found irregularities involving the PPAs of SS Power, owned by S Alam Group and Summit Power of Summit Group, they said.
Summit's Meghnaghat project was built despite gas shortages, with unit costs nearly double those of other plants, it has been alleged.
SS Power's Banshkhali plant is among the most expensive coal-based projects, while Reliance relocated a defunct Indian plant to Bangladesh, they added.
Losses counted by state-run Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) escalated to around Tk 500 billion in 2025 from only around Tk 55 billion in 2009 due to the massive irregularities carried out during the Awami League government, the committee reveals.
The 25-year agreement with Adani Power has become most prominent symbol of alleged corruption, they said.
The Adani plant was built in Godda, Jharkhand, despite restrictions on exporting electricity generated from local coal, the committee report reveals.
As a result, coal is imported from Australia, shipped by sea, and transported across India by rail -- an expensive process borne entirely by Bangladeshi consumers.
Bangladesh is also paying for India's transmission costs and taxes levied on Adani, which the committee describes as "irrational and unjustifiable".
Despite a fourfold increase in generation capacity over 14 years, payments to private producers have risen eleven-fold, they said.
Capacity payments -- fees paid to plants even when idle -- have surged twentyfold, costing the BPDB up to US$ 1.5 billion annually.
Nearly 9,500 megawatts of electricity remains unused due to fuel shortages and infrastructure limits, it points out.
The committee also has urged immediate cancellation of contracts proven to involve corruption and renegotiation of costly power-purchase agreements.
It also recommends mandatory competitive bidding for future projects and the creation of an independent energy watchdog to ensure transparency.
"The corruption was massive -- it can't be accepted at all," said the committee chief, retired High Court judge Moinul Islam Chowdhury.
The committee saw through all the deals and necessary documents of the power plants that were awarded and implemented under the now-defunct Quick Enhancement of Electricity and Energy Supply (Special Provision) Act 2010.
These power plants were awarded without any competitive bidding under the special law that offered indemnity to all those involved in the power dealings.
Other members of the committee, including Professor Abdul Hasib Chowdhury of the Electrical and Electronics Department at Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), Ali Ashfaq, fellow chartered accountant (FCA), and Prof Moshtaq Hossain Khan of the Faculty of Law and Social Science, the University of London, also spoke on the occasion about their findings.
The post-uprising interim government constituted the five-member national committee on September 5 last year to review the deals inked under the special law.
As per the terms of reference (TOR), the expert panel checked whether government interests were protected in the deals already inked under the special act.
It scrutinized data from 2008 to 2024 to prepare the interim report.
azizjst@yahoo.com