Former ICICI Bank chief Chanda Kochhar, husband arrested in Rs 3,250 crore loan fraud case

Former ICICI Bank CEO Chanda Kochhar and her husband Deepak Kochhar were arrested by the CBI on Friday in a case linked to alleged irregularities in a loan of Rs 3,250 crore in 2012 to the Videocon Group.

Chanda Kochhar, 59, had to resign as CEO and managing director of ICICI Bank in October 2018 over allegations that she favoured Videocon Group in giving loans which became a non-performing asset for the ICICI Bank.

ICICI said a year later that it would treat Ms Kochhar’s exit as “termination” as she violated the bank’s code of conduct.

According to the CBI chargesheet, former Videocon chairman Venugopal Dhoot allegedly invested crores of rupees in NuPower Renewables, a company founded by Mr Kochhar, just months after the Videocon group was given a loan by the bank as a quid pro quo.

The loan was cleared by a committee of which Ms Kochhar was a member. The CBI has alleged that she abused her official position and “got illegal gratification/undue benefit through her husband from Dhoot for sanctioning Rs 300 crore to Videocon.”

The case came to light after a whistleblower alleged that Ms Kochhar’s husband Deepak Kochhar had benefited from the loans extended by ICICI Bank.

Chanda Kochhar had taken the stand that none of the credit decisions at the bank were unilateral. The bank management had initially tried to defend its powerful CEO but then as facts started tumbling out, asked her to resign.