Money laundering case: Businessman Deepak Kochhar seeks bail

Deepak Kochhar was arrested bythe ED in September under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in the ICICI Bank-Videocon money laundering case. The businessman, through his lawyer, applied for bail on merits as well as on account of default, claiming the prosecution has failed to file a charge-sheet in the case within stipulated period.

Businessman Deepak Kochhar, husband of former ICICI Bank CEO Chanda Kochhar and an accused in a money laundering case, on Wednesday moved a bail application before a special court here. Deepak Kochhar was arrested bythe ED in September under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in the ICICI Bank-Videocon money laundering case.

The businessman, through his lawyer, applied for bail on merits as well as on account of default, claiming the prosecution has failed to file a charge-sheet in the case within stipulated period. The prosecution said the charge-sheet wasfiled on November 3.

However,it is pending scrutiny by the department concerned since there are five trunks full of documents that need to be verified, it said. Following this, the court will take cognisance of the chargesheet.

The bail plea was posted for hearing on Thursday by the special PMLA court. The ED had arrested Deepak Kochhar in September after it filed a criminal case of money laundering after studying an FIR registered by the CBI against the Kochhars, Videocon Group promoter Venugopal Dhoot and others.

The central probe agency slapped money laundering charges against the Kochhars and their business entities for "illegal sanctioning of loans amounting to Rs 1,875 crore to the Videocon Group of companies". The ED had earlier said an amount of Rs 64 crore, out of the Rs 300 crore loan sanctioned by a committee headed by Chanda Kochhar to Videocon International Electronics Ltd, was transferred to Nupower Renewables Pvt Ltd (NRPL) by Videocon Industries Ltd on September 8, 2009, just a day after disbursement of the loan by ICICI Bank.

NRPL was earlier known as Nupower Renewables Ltd (NRL) and is a company of Deepak Kochhar. The agency had alleged that the "net revenue of Rs 10.

65 crore was generated by NRL from these tainted funds". "Therefore, proceeds of crime amounting to Rs 74.65 crore were transferred to or to say generated in NRPL," the ED had claimed.

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