Deepak Kochhar, husband of former MD & CEO of ICICI Bank Chanda Kochhar, with her leaves the CBI Special Court after appearing before it in the ICICI money laundering case, in Mumbai, on Dec. 26, 2022.
| Photo Credit: PTI
A special court in Mumbai on Thursday remanded former managing director and chief executive officer of ICICI Bank, Chanda, her husband Deepak Kochhar, and Videocon group promoter Venugopal Dhoot to judicial custody in the ICICI bank fraud case.
The couple was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on December 23 and Mr. Dhoot was arrested on December 26. Special CBI judge A.A. Sayed on Thursday sent them to judicial custody till January 10 after CBI’s counsel informed the court that their custody was no longer needed.
The CBI has alleged that ICICI bank under the leadership of Ms. Kochhar sanctioned a credit of ₹3,250 crore to companies owned by the Videocon Group which are in direct violation of The Banking Regulation Act, guidelines by the Reserve Bank of India and the credit policies of banks.
The CBI registered a First Information Report in January 2019 that charged Ms. Kochhar with cheating and criminal conspiracy and for causing loss to ICICI Bank by sanctioning loans to Videocon Group of companies in contravention of the rules and policies of ICICI Bank during the relevant period. These loans given to Videocon Group of companies have turned into Non-Performing Assets (NPA) and thus resulted in a wrongful loss to ICICI Bank and wrongful gain to the borrowers and accused persons.
As per the central agency, “From June 2009 to October 2011, ICICI Bank had sanctioned six high-value loans to various Videocon Group companies. On August 26, 2009, a Rupee Term Loan (RTL) of ₹300 Crore was sanctioned to Videocon International Electronics Limited (VIEL) in contravention of the rules and policy by the sanctioning committee. Ms. Kochhar was one of the members of the sanctioning committee, who in a criminal conspiracy to cheat ICICI Bank and in pursuance of criminal conspiracy on the same day dishonestly by abusing her official position sanctioned this loan in favour of VIEL.”
