Mumbai: The ICICI Bank has reported its smallest profit in seven quarters – in fact, there was a 45 per cent decline in consolidated net profit in the fourth quarter. The results have come out against the backdrop of a series of allegations of impropriety in extending loans to some companies and charges of conflict of interest against managing director and chief executive Chanda Kochhar.
Yet, Kochhar said the bank did not need to disclose any additional bad loans for the last financial year after a central bank audit of its books. She did not give details of the audit but said it was below the threshold set by the Reserve Bank of India for banks to report so-called divergence in bad loans. She admitted provisioning for bad loans was up but insisted that bad loan additions were slowing.
Also, there was no discussion on such pressing matters as the controversial lending to Videocon. “Today, there was no discussion at all on this issue. The board has already clarified its stance,” Kochhar said, when asked whether the matter was discussed. Asked about the silence maintained by her as well as the bank, even though details of the alleged misdoings are