ICICI Bank Case: CBI Grills Rajiv Kochhar, Two NuPower Directors. 10 Things To Know
- Umanath Vainkut Nayak and Mahesh Chandra Pugalia, a close aide of Videocon Group chief Venugopal Dhoot, are the directors of NuPower, the company formed by Chanda Kochhar's husband Deepak Kocchar and Dhoot in December 2008.
- All three were questioned at the Central Bureau of Investigation's (CBI) Bandra office in Mumbai.
- Rajiv Kochhar was questioned for the fourth consecutive day on Sunday while Pugalia was examined for the second consecutive day in connection with the case.
- CBI, however, questioned Nayak first time in the case to probe his role in offering consultancy services if any to Videocon Group being investigated by the CBI.
- Pugalia was also asked over the issue as he was previously an employee of Videocon Group and used to offer consultancy services to the firm. Nayak and Pugalia were confronted during the questioning, said sources in the CBI.
- According to the CBI officials, the two directors of NuPower Renewables were also asked about the role of Rajiv's Singapore-based company Avista Advisory in the restructuring of loan.
- The duo was also asked about the help Pugalia extended to Videocon in securing the loan from the ICICI Bank, which was part of a Rs 40,000 crore credit given by a consortium of 20 banks, led by the State Bank of India, to the Videocon Group.
- The CBI on Thursday and Friday, Saturday, too, questioned Rajiv Kochhar for hours in connection with the case. He was on Thursday stopped at Mumbai airport by immigration authorities around 11 a.m. when he was about to leave for Singapore. Later, he was handed over to a CBI which is questioning him as part of its preliminary probe against his brother Deepak Kochhar and Dhoot.
- CBI had registered a preliminary inquiry against Deepak Kochhar, Videocon Group officials and others to determine any wrongdoing or otherwise in the sanction of loan to the Group by the ICICI Bank as part of the consortium of banks in 2012.
- Chanda Kochhar, who is facing questions of conflict of interest in the case, has not been named in the preliminary inquiry, which was registered after news reports raised questions about the Videocon Chairman giving loan of Rs 64 crore to a firm he had jointly promoted with Deepak Kochhar, six months after his group got the Rs 3,250 crore loan. (With IANS inputs)
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