Sushree Mohanty
A special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court has allowed the bail plea of the former managing director of ICICI Bank, Chanda Kochhar on a signed bond of Rupees 5 Lakhs.
Additionally, the court has directed her to not leave the country without prior permission.
Kochhar was summoned before the Mumbai PMLA Court with regards to the ICICI Bank-Videocon money laundering and loan case.
The Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court on January 30,2021 had taken cognizance of the matter and sent a notice to Kochhar, her husband Deepak Kochhar, Videocon Group Promoter Venugopal Dhoot and others to appear before the court.
While taking notice of the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) charge sheet, Judge AA Nandgaonkar observed that the entries, written applications and statements recorded under PMLA indicated that that Chanda Kochhar had abused her authority position in giving loan to Dhoot or the Videocon group organizations.
Additionally the court noted that “she got illegal gratification /undue advantage through her husband… through various companies for siphoning off money and proceeds of crime.”
On November 3, 2020, The Enforcement Directorate had filed a grievance against Kochhar, her husband Deepak Kochhar and Venugopal Dhoot and blamed eight other organizations for their association in illegal money laundering and tax avoidance cases.
The Directorate began the investigations after Central Bureau of Investigation of India (CBI) filed a case of corruption against the Kochhars.
In 2017, the CBI had also started an inquiry against the couple after an informant claimed that ICICI Bank had endorsed credit office of about ₹3,250 crores to different companies in contradiction to the principles and policies.
The CBI filed a First Information Report (FIR) in January 2020, and claimed that six high-estimated credits worth of ₹1,875 crore were given by ICICI Bank to Videocon group organizations somewhere in between the year of 2009 and 2011.
It was claimed that in 2009, credit loans were allotted to Videocon in repudiation of rules and policies by the authorizing panel. Kochhar was one of the individuals from the board of committee at that period of time.
Further, a ₹300 crore loan was given to M/s Videocon International Electronics Limited, a Videocon Group Company on September 7, 2009. It is claimed that ₹64 crore out of the total sum was sanctioned to M/s NuPower Renewables Pvt Ltd by Videocon Industries Limited (VIL) on September 8, 2009.
NRPL was formerly called as Nupower Renewables Limited (NRL) and the accused Deepak Kochhar is its owner, as alleged by the ED.
The Enforcement Directorate had detained Deepak Kochhar in September 2020 after it registered a criminal case for money laundering by the CBI against the Kochhars, Dhoot and others.
“The material produced by the ED constitutes the commission of offence, and it is “sufficient to proceed against the accused persons,” the court stated.
The Court had asked all the persons accused in the case to be present before it on February 12, 2021.