The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday said it has registered a case against Deepak Kochhar in connection with the Rs 3,250 crore loan to the Videocon Group given in 2012. The accused is the husband of former ICICI Bank MD and CEO Chanda Kochhar. Several teams of the CBI carried out searches at four places in Mumbai after registering the case and covered offices at Nupower, a company operated by Deepak Kochhar.
According to a senior official of the CBI, the action comes in the wake of a preliminary enquiry the agency registered on March 31, 2018 against Deepak Kochhar, Videocon group officials and others to determine whether any wrongdoing was involved in the sanctioning of the loan by the ICICI Bank as part of a consortium.
A preliminary enquiry is conducted to determine if there is enough evidence of wrongdoing for a case to be taken up for detailed investigation. If sufficient evidence suggests a cognizable offence has been committed, then this is converted into a regular First Information Report (FIR).
The CBI registered the preliminary enquiry after news reports raised questions about Videocon Chairman Venugopal Dhoot allegedly providing crores of rupees to a firm promoted by Deepak Kochhar and a few relatives six months after his (Dhoot's) group got the Rs 3,250 crore loan from the ICICI Bank.
The said amount was part of a loan of Rs 40,000 crore which Videocon got from a consortium of 20 banks led by the State Bank of India.
On October 4, 2018, Chanda Kochhar quit as ICICI Bank CEO and MD.
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