Videocon loan fraud case: CBI gets 3-day custody of ex-ICICI Bank CEO Chanda Kochhar, Deepak Kochhar

Chanda Kochhar in ICICI loan fraud case: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Saturday got the custody of former ICICI Bank CEO Chanda Kochhar and Deepak Kochhar, her husband, for three days after they were produced at a special Mumbai court. The Kocchars were arrested on Friday after the CBI said that the Kochhars were evasive in their responses and did not cooperate in the investigation.  

Chanda Kochhar and her husband Deepak Kochhar are accused of cheating and irregularities in an over Rs 3,000-crore loan provided to the Videocon Group disbursed by ICICI bank in 2012 when she was at the helm. The alleged money laundering case is related to siphoning off six high-value loans from the ICICI Bank to various companies of Videocon Ltd worth around Rs 1,575 crore between June 2009 and October 2011.   

The CBI said Videocon promoter Venugopal Dhoot allegedly invested crores in Nupower Renewable, where Chanda Kochhar’s husband Deepak had a 50 per cent stake. The investment was done after the Videocon Group got Rs 3,250 crore as a loan from ICICI Bank in 2012, which was sanctioned by Chanda. 

But eventually, the disbursed loan turned into a Non-Performing Asset (NPA), and was later marked as a 'bank fraud'. In October 2018, Chanda Kochhar, now 59, stepped down as the CEO and MD of the bank, and charges were put that she “favoured Videocon Group” for the loan, a consumer electronics and oil and gas exploration company.  

In an FIR issued in 2019, the CBI said that the accused, Chanda, sanctioned certain loans to private companies in a criminal conspiracy with others to cheat ICICI Bank. In September 2020, the Enforcement Directorate arrested Deepak Kochhar as one of the main accused in the ICICI-Videocon loan case and was booked under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

The CBI has now booked Chanda Kochhar, her husband, and Venugopal Dhoot of Videocon Group, along with companies Nupower Renewables, Supreme Energy, Videocon International Electronics Ltd, and Videocon Industries Limited, as accused in the FIR registered under IPC sections related to criminal conspiracy and provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act, they said.

In the probe it was found when the first loan of Rs 300 crore was disbursed to Videocon on September 9, 2009, on the very next day Dhoot transferred Rs 64 crore to  Nupower Renewables Pvt Ltd, which was earlier known as Nupower Renewables Limited (NRL). Deepak Kochhar owned the managed NRPL through his company SEPL.