Published on 10 Oct 2025
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently invoked the Hague Service Convention (HSC) of 1965 to serve summons on Indian billionaire Gautam Adani for a securities and wire fraud case.
The HSC, officially known as the Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil or Commercial Matters, is a multilateral treaty adopted on November 15, 1965, in The Hague, Netherlands.
This multilateral treaty ensures that defendants sued in foreign jurisdictions (in this case, Gautam Adani in India by a US court) receive timely and actual notice of legal proceedings while also facilitating proof of service.
India, a signatory since 2006, processes such requests solely through its Ministry of Law and Justice, acting like a special delivery service for international court documents.
The Indian government will check the request from the US and can refuse if they think it's a threat to India's rules.
Upon approval, the Ministry of Law and Justice will deliver the papers to Adani as if an Indian court had asked, and this process typically takes six to eight months for completion and official confirmation back to the US,
Hague Service Convention
securities
wire fraud case
Ministry of Law and Justice
Gautam Adani