In the ongoing Videocon loan fraud case investigation, the Bombay High Court (HC) has granted bail to the former ICICI Bank Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Chanda Kochhar and her husband Deepak Kochhar. The orders by the Bombay HC mentioned that both the alleged accused have been granted bail as the arrests were "not in accordance with the law."
According to a report in the Business Standard, the release of both Chanda Kochhar and Deepak Kochhar has been ordered on a cash bail of Rs 1 lakh. Since both were arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in December, they termed their arrest "illegal" and vouched against it.
The matter was reportedly heard by a division bench of Justice Revati Mohit-Dere and Justice Prithviraj K Chavan. The report adds that in the hearing, the Bombay HC judges said that the petitioner's arrest "is not in accordance with law and not in compliance with section 41A of the criminal procedure code."
In December, the CBI had arrested Chanda Kochhar, Deepak Kochhar and even Videocon's Venugopal Dhoot in the infamous Videocon-ICICI Bank loan fraud case. In the FIR registered, the investigation agency had also named Nupower Renewables (NRL), Supreme Energy, Videocon International Electronics Ltd and Videocon Industries Limited, apart from them, as the accused.
As far as the Videocon-ICICI Bank loan fraud case goes, it has been alleged that the loan granted by ICICI Bank to the companies of Videocon Group was in violation of the Banking Regulation Act, RBI guidelines and even the credit policy of ICICI Bank itself. Since it has been alleged that the loan approvals happened under Chanda Kochhar's watch, even she has been named a prime accused in the whole saga.
Disclaimer: This is a developing story. More details will be added once information is available.
