Videocon-ICICI case: ED chargesheets Chanda Kochhar, others, with ‘5 trunks’ of supporting documents

New Delhi, November 4: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) filed a chargesheet, along with “five trunks” of supporting documents, before a special court in Mumbai on Tuesday in the case of alleged money laundering against the former managing director and chief executive officer of ICICI Bank, Chanda Kochhar, her husband Deepak Kochhar, and Videocon Group chief Venugopal Dhoot, among others.

“It is informed that the chargesheet is pending for scrutiny of five trunks of original documents. The intimation (of it being filed) is taken on record,” the court said. The case has been adjourned to November 11.

Sources told The Indian Express that at least eight other entities, including Nu Power Renewables Ltd, Videocon International Electronics Ltd (VIEL), Videocon Industries Ltd and Supreme Energy Pvt Ltd, have been named in the chargesheet or “prosecution complaint”.

The ED’s case against the Kochhar family pertains to the alleged illegal sanctioning of loans of Rs 1,875 crore by ICICI Bank, during the tenure of Chanda Kochhar, to Videocon Group.

According to the ED, it found that loans were refinanced and new loans adding up to Rs 1,730 crore were sanctioned to Videocon Industries Limited (VIL) and its group companies, and that these loans became non-performing assets (NPA) for ICICI Bank in June 2017.

The agency has alleged that a committee headed by Chanda Kochhar sanctioned a loan of Rs 300 crore to VIEL in 2009. Out of this amount, it alleged, at least Rs 64 crore was transferred by VIEL to NuPower Renewables, a company owned by Kochhar’s husband on September 8, 2009, a day after the loan was disbursed by the bank. The ED has also alleged that a net revenue of Rs 10.65 crore was generated by NuPower Renewables from these “tainted funds”.

The agency has, so far, provisionally attached assets worth Rs 78.15 crore of the Kochhar family, including an apartment at the upscale CCI Chambers in South Mumbai, allegedly acquired by Kochhars through Videocon Group firms.

Deepak Kochhar, who was arrested by the ED in September 2019 in connection with the case, is currently in judicial custody.

On March 31, 2018, The Indian Express had first reported how in December 2008, Dhoot set up NuPower Renewables Pvt Ltd (NRPL) with Deepak Kochhar and two of Chanda Kochhar’s relatives, and then gave a Rs 64-crore loan to this company through a fully owned entity before he transferred the latter’s ownership to a trust headed by Deepak Kochhar for just Rs 9 lakh.

https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/mumbai/ed-files-chargesheet-in-chanda-kochhar-case-with-5-trunks-of-supporting-documents-6948202/