Arrest of Videocon chief may not impact its stock

• Dhooth held in ICICI bank fraud case

• Probe agency may seek his custodial remand

• Dhooth helped Kochhar get the ownership of Nupower Renewables Ltd (NRL)

• Deepak Kochhar, Venugopal Dhoot and Saurabh Dhoot were first directors of NRL

• V Dhoot and Saurabh Dhoot resigned from the directorship in 2009

• Before resigning, Venugopal Dhoot allotted 1,997,500 warrants to Deepak Kochhar at Rs10 per warrant, on an initial payment of Rs1 per warrant

Mumbai: Experts believe that the arrest of Videocon chairman by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) will not have much impact on the company's performance at stock exchange. The reason being cited by them is the fact that the stock of the company has not been doing very well at the stock exchange for quite some time.

The CBI arrested Videocon Chairman Venugopal Dhoot in the ICICI bank fraud case. This comes just days after the agency arrested ICICI Bank's former CEO and MD, Chanda Kochhar, and her husband, Deepak Kochhar on December 23. The special CBI court remanded the couple on Saturday and revealed that Kochhar was helped by Dhoot to get the ownership of Nupower Renewables Ltd (NRL). NRL was incorporated on December 24, 2008, with Deepak Kochhar, Venugopal Dhoot, and Saurabh Dhoot as the first directors of the company.

Venugopal Dhoot and Saurabh Dhoot resigned from the directorship of the company in 2009. However, before resigning from the directorship, Venugopal Dhoot allotted 1,997,500 warrants to Deepak Kochhar at the rate of Rs10 per warrant, on an initial payment of Rs1 per warrant.

Talking to Bizz Buzz, Arun Kejriwal, Founder of Kejriwal Research and Investment Services (KRIS), said: "Law catches up with everyone, irrespective of status. This was long pending which has finally happened now."

"The company, in any case, is not doing significantly well, so the arrest of Venugopal Dhoot will not have any impact on the company's performance that much," he said.

In 2009, the shares of NRL held by Venugopal Dhoot and Deepak Kochhar's group Pacific Capital Services Pvt Ltd were transferred to SEPL, which became a 95 per cent shareholder of NRL.

Supreme Energy Pvt Ltd (SEPL) was incorporated in 2008 with Venugopal Dhoot (9,990 shares) and his associate Vasant Kakade (10 shares) as its first directors. Venugopal Dhoot resigned from the directorship of SEPL in 2009 and transferred control of the said company to Deepak

Kochhar by transferring his shares to Pinnacle Energy Trust (PET), which was managed by Deepak Kochhar.

CBI has also alleged that when Chanda took charge of ICICI Bank, six loans were wrongfully sanctioned to various companies of Videocon.

The federal agency has further alleged that she influenced other committees to sanction loans to the Videocon Group.

The agency had alleged cheating and irregularities in loans sanctioned by the bank to the Videocon group between 2009 and 2011 when Kochhar was heading the bank.