Loan fraud case: Venugopal Dhoot’s plea against arrest rejected by special CBI court

The special CBI court on Thursday rejected Videocon Group promoter Venugopal Dhoot’s plea challenging his arrest in the ICICI Bank loan fraud case

The special CBI court on Thursday rejected Videocon Group promoter Venugopal Dhoot’s plea challenging his arrest in the ICICI Bank loan fraud case.

Mumbai, Dec 26 (ANI): Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials produce Videocon chairman Venugopal Dhoot before the CBI court in connection with an alleged ICICI Bank-Videocon loan fraud case, in Mumbai on Monday. (ANI Photo) (ANI)

Dhoot’s co-accused and former ICICI Bank MD and CEO Chanda Kochhar and her husband Deepak Kochhar too failed to get any relief after the court turned down their request for provision of mattresses and chairs in jail.

Besides, the pleas of the trio for home-cooked food were dismissed. However, the prison authorities were directed to provide the Kochhars with diet food based on the medical officer’s recommendations.

The couple was arrested by the CBI on December 23 and Dhoot was arrested three days later. While Deepak and Dhoot are lodged in Arthur Road jail, Chanda is housed in Byculla women’s prison.

Dhoot’s lawyers S S Ladda and Viral Babar claimed that he had always cooperated with the investigating officer, and that he was never arrested by the ED which had filed its prosecution complaint before the special PMLA court in a connected case.

Ladda further said Dhoot was arrested under pressure and on the day of his arrest, he had visited the CBI office to join the probe. Hence, there was no question of him evading the investigation, the handwritten plea said.

The CBI summoned Dhoot for questioning on December 25 but he could not appear before the investigation officer as he was admitted to a hospital in Aurangabad, the plea said, adding the next day, the agency arrested him for non-cooperation.

The CBI claimed that they had issued a notice to Dhoot as they needed to confront him with Kochhars. Even if he had cooperated with the ED that did not mean he willingly joined the CBI probe too, it said.

After hearing both sides, the court refused to grant any relief to Dhoot. A detailed order is, however, awaited.

According to the CBI, between June 2009 and October 2011, ICICI Bank had sanctioned rupee term loans (RTL) of ₹1,875 crore to six companies of Videocon Group for the purpose of enabling them to repay the unsecured loans obtained from M/s Videocon Industries Limited.

All these loans were sanctioned after Chanda Kochhar took over as the MD and CEO of the private bank. She was on the sanctioning committee when two loans - RTL of ₹300 crore to M/s Videocon International Electronics Limited and RTL of ₹750 Crore to M/S Videocon Industries Limited - were sanctioned.

ICICI Bank had also released the security in the form of fixed deposits of ₹50 crore to the accounts of Videocon Group companies - M/s Sky Appliance Limited and M/s Techno Electronic Limited.

It is further alleged that on April 26, 2012, the existing outstanding of the six RTL accounts were adjusted in RTL of ₹1,730 crore sanctioned to M/S VIL under refinance of domestic debt. The account of M/s VIL was declared NPA with effect from June 30, 2017, and the present outstanding amount in the a/c is ₹1,033 crore.