India: CBI arrests Videocon chairman Venugopal Dhoot in ICICI money laundering case

On Monday, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested Videocon chairman Venugopal Dhoot, co-accused in the ICICI bank money laundering case.

Dhoot has been arrested from Mumbai, and was also questioned by the CBI a few days back.

On December 23, CBI had arrested Chanda Kochhar and Deepak Kochhar. The couple is scheduled to remain in CBI custody till today (December 26).

CBI has alleged that Deepak Kochhar, husband of former ICICI Bank CEO-MD Chanda Kochhar, was helped by a co-accused to acquire ownership of Nupower Renewables Ltd (NRL), and in receiving ill-gotten money.

The investigative agency had registered a preliminary enquiry (PE) against Deepak Kochhar and Dhoot in March 2018 to probe alleged irregularities in the Rs400 billion loan made by a consortium of lenders to the Videocon Group.

The agency had registered a case against Chanda, her husband and Venugopal Dhoot, along with their companies NuPower Renewables, Supreme Energy, Videocon International Electronics Ltd and Videocon Industries Limited.

During its preliminary enquiry, the CBI found that six loans worth Rs18.75 billion were sanctioned to the Videocon Group, and companies associated with it between June 2009 and October 2011 allegedly violated the policies of ICICI Bank, which is part of the probe.

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