ICICI CEO Chanda Kochhar could resign in next 10 Days; Rumour or Reality?

In Videocon loan case, ICICI Bank has started a change in its top management. Bank CEO and Managing Director Chanda Kochhar is now on an indefinite time forced leave. Sandeep Bakshi has been appointed as the Chief Operating Officer of the bank. There are still more changes could be seen in next few days. According to one of the official person,”Chanda Kochhar is not on leave, She has been sent on Force Leave by the Bank“. It is being said by the board that the bank is conducting internal investigations in the Videocon loan case. “Chanda Kochar will be on leave till the investigation is completed”. However, according to sources, Chanda Kochhar can resign within the next 10 days. Its process has started. New CEO can be announced by June 30.

ICICI Bank has said that in the order of high-level governance and corporate standards, Chanda Kochhar has decided to go on leave till the completion of the enquiry as announced on May 30, 2018.

Due to this case, an informal meeting was held between the Independent Directors and the appointed directors of the ICICI bank. Since then, Chanda Kochhar is on leave. In this meeting, Director discussed about the morale of the staff and the confidence of their investors. At the same time, some board members have shown their doubt over Chanda Kochhar on this Loan Fraud Issue.

Sandeep Bakshi appoints as ICICI Bank COO

According to ICICI Bank source, Chanda Kochhar was sent on forced leave. Actually, RBI is putting pressure over ICICI Bank to keep Chanda Kochhar on leave till an independent probe into allegations of impropriety against her is completed. At the same time, some board members want to appoint Chanda Kochhar as the new CEO at the earliest. For this, Sandeep Bakshi has been appointed as COO for some time, but soon he will be given the post of interim CEO and after the resignation of Chanda Kochar, he can be appointed as the new CEO of the bank.

In addition to the CEO post, the post of chairman of the bank is also going to be vacant soon and no new name has been finalized so far. It is expecting that the name of the chairman and CEO can be finalized in a few days. However, the CEO’s name will be final only when Chanda Kochhar will resign. In such a situation, it is clear that the board is making changes in the top management. The term of the current Chairman MK Sharma is also being completed on 30th June. And it is expected that the bank can announce the name of the new chairman till 28 or 29 June.

Is ICICI Bank Board working under Pressure?

The RBI has been given strict guidelines to Private Banks after getting more loan defaulting cases happened in India. However, the RBI had clarified that it does not have enough powers so he can not directly put pressure on private banks. However, the RBI had recently rejected a name, which was sent by the ICICI Bank for chairman post.