As a major development in the ICICI Bank-Videocon loan case, the bank has reportedly given its sanction to prosecute ICICI Bank’s former CEO Chanda Kochhar. As per updates, the counsel for the probe agency has informed a court about the same with regards to a corruption case registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
As per a report in the Economic Times, ICICI Bank’s former CEO Chanda Kochhar has been booked under the Prevention of Corruption Act. There are also charges of cheating and criminal conspiracy under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) after she was accused of irregularities in sanctioning loans to the Videocon Group as the CEO (now former) of ICICI Bank.
The report adds that ICICI Bank has maintained its stand of “no wrongful loss caused to the bank”. While communicating with the CBI, it repeated its stand and gave sanction to conduct the probe.
As far as the case goes, the special CBI court handling the Videocon-ICICI Bank loan case is reportedly verifying the chargesheet. Once that is done, it would decide on taking cognisance of the chargesheet in order to start a trial. Updates are awaited.
“While the BoD has granted sanction, the communication still maintains that there has been no loss caused to the bank and that Kochhar could be tried for corruption charges,” the Economic Times quoted a source as saying.
The development comes in response to the anti-corruption law, under which, the approval of a competent authority (ICICI Bank in this case) is needed to conduct the investigation and prosecute the accused. Since ICICI Bank’s ex-CEO Chanda Kochhar is the main accused in the Videocon-ICICI Bank loan case, the bank’s approval to prosecute her, becomes imperative.
