There have been a series of rumours ICICI Bank’s managing director and CEO Chanda Kochhar and her family members have provided a loan to Venugopal Dhoot’s Videocon group on quid pro quo basis. Refusing to believe the same, the ICICI Bank’s board has said that it trusts Kochhar despite the “malicious rumours”.
The bank’s internal processes for credit approval have been checked by the board and were found to be robust.
“The board has full confidence and reposes full faith in the bank’s MD and CEO Ms Chanda Kochhar,” said the board in a statement, as they believe that these baseless whispers are nothing but a trick to malign the name of the bank and its top management.
“The board has come to the conclusion that there is no question of any quid pro quo/ nepotism/ conflict of interest as is being alleged in various rumours,” the bank said. Kochhar’s husband Deepak is also suspected under transactions of the Videocon group and NUPower Renewables, a company operated by him.
“ICICI Bank was not the lead bank for this consortium and the bank only sanctioned its share of facilities aggregating approximately Rs 3,250 crore which was less than 10 percent of the total consortium facility in April 2012,” said the board on loans to the Videocon group, saying that the bank’s exposure was the part of a syndicated consortium arrangement. None of the investors of NuPower Renewables had been borrowers of ICICI Bank, clarified the bank.
The board had to respond to a similar situation back in 2016, when such rumours were making the round and the bank had duly replied then too.
As for this time, “It can be concluded that there are adequate checks and balances in loan appraisal, rating and approval processes within the bank, both from the control as well as from a governance perspective.” said the board, clarifying that it reviewed the internal processes and information of the exposure to the Videocon group.
H/T: Hindustan Times