New Delhi, Mar 23 (EFE) .- Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, head of the conglomerate Adani Group, has fallen 11 places to 23rd in the list of the world's richest people, according to the list prepared by Hurun Report, dubbed as the Chinese version of Forbes.

Adani lost 35 percent of his fortune after accusations of fraud on the eve of a large stock market operation.

"India's Gautam Adani in February was down US$70bn after a US short seller alleged accounting fraud and stock manipulations, sparking a crisis in his empire, but later regaining over half to end the year US$30bn down," Hurun Report said in a press release Thursday.

The business magnate now possesses a personal fortune of $53 billion. Just before the report, Adani was the second richest person in the world

Adani began to plummet on the stock market after the publication of a report by the US investment group Hindenburg Research on Jan.25, which accused the conglomerate of stock manipulation and stock market fraud.

According to the two-year research report, based on interviews with former executives of the conglomerate and extensive documents, Adani added most of his fortune through stock price appreciation in the group's seven key companies, which increased an average of 819 percent in that period.

Adani's fortune made an impressive jump between 2019 and 2022, when it went from $8.9 billion to more than $100 billion.

Opposition political parties have demanded in the Indian Parliament an investigation led by a joint committee into the fraud allegations.

Meanwhile, the Indian government has avoided examining the matter amid accusations of Adani's close ties with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. EFE

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