Ms Kochhar got bail on a bond of Rs 5 lakh by PMLA court on Friday.
Former MD and CEO of ICICI Bank, Chanda Kochhar was granted bail in an alleged money laundering case by a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court on Friday. Ms Kochhar got bail on a bond of Rs 5 lakh and also on the condition not to leave the country without permission of the court.
In the year 2019, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had filed a criminal case against Ms Kochhar, her husband Deepak Kochhar and Venugopal Dhoot of the Videocon Group. The case was filed under PMLA to investigate the money laundry charges that included sanctioning of Rs 1,875 crore in loans by ICICI Bank. The ED had arrested Mr Kochhar in September 2020 after it filed a criminal case for money laundering based on an FIR registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against the Kochhars, Dhoot and others.
The ED is also probing at least two other instances of loans that were given by ICICI Bank to Gujarat-based pharmaceutical firm Sterling Biotech and to Bhushan Steel Group during Ms Kochhar's tenure. Both are being probed for alleged money laundering. The CBI is running an independent investigation and it alleged that Mr Dhoot invested in NuPower through another company - Supreme Energy - in a quid pro quo deal through loans that were cleared by ICICI after Ms Kochhar became CEO of ICICI Bank in May 2009.
The ED has alleged that Rs 64 crore, out of a loan amount of Rs 300 crore sanctioned by a committee of ICICI Bank headed by Chanda Kochhar to Videocon International Electronics Limited, was transferred to Nupower Renewables Pvt Ltd (NRPL) by Videocon Industries on September 8, 2009, a day after the disbursement of loan. The ED said that NRPL which was earlier known as Nupower Renewables Limited (NRL) is owned by Mr Kochhar.
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