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ICICI Bank's CEO and MD Chanda Kochhar, who is facing an independent enquiry in connections with loan given to Videocon Group, has decided go on leave till the completion of the inquiry.
The bank, in a stock exchange filing, said that in March 2018 it was "made aware" on the complaint which alleged, among other things irregularities in the conduct of some borrower accounts, resulting in incorrect asset classification.
The complaint cited 31 loan accounts.
"The complaint was treated as a whistle blower complaint and an enquiry was instituted as per the Whistle Blower Policy of the Bank under the supervision of the Audit Committee of the Board of Directors, without involvement of the senior management other than Internal Audit," ICICI Bank said.
The statutory auditors were provided periodic updates and their inputs were factored into the enquiry process.
The interim report of the enquiry was reviewed in detail by the Audit Committee and statutory auditors, prior to finalisation of the accounts for the year ended March 31, 2018.
"The findings in the interim report had no material impact on the financial statements for FY2018. The interim report has also been submitted to the regulator," the private sector lender said.
It further said the loans outstanding were fully classified as non-performing, with provisions made as per applicable norms.
These accounts were classified as non-performing between the year ended March 31, 2012 and the year ended March 31, 2017, other than two accounts which were classified by December 31, 2017.
"Thus, all these loans had been classified as non- performing prior to the Bank becoming aware of the complaint," the filing said.
The aggregate loans (in the 31 cases) outstanding at March 31, 2018 were Rs 60.82 billion ( $898 million), about 1.1 per cent of gross loans.
The provision coverage (including prudential/ technical write-offs) was 50 per cent.
Further, based on the procedures performed in the enquiry, the allegations relating to incorrect accounting of interest income and NPA recoveries as fees, and overvaluation of security for corporate loans, "were not borne out".
Also, no disclosure on divergence in asset classification and provisioning for NPAs was required to be made by the bank with respect to RBI's annual supervisory process for 2016-17, it added.
Republican congressmen described frantic efforts to find cover as they felt like “sitting ducks” when a gunman opened fire on them during their practice Wednesday in Alexandria, Virginia, for the Congressional Baseball Game.
House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, Hill staffer Zack Barth, former staffer Matt Mika who still works out with the team, and Capitol Police officers Krystal Griner and David Bailey were wounded in the attack before officers shot the gunman.
Rep. Gary Palmer of Alabama said the team was taking batting practice while he was playing shortstop. Mississippi Rep. Trent Kelly was at third base and Scalise at second base.
Tennessee Rep. Chuck Fleischmann said the shooter was firing at Kelly as he ran toward the first base dugout.
Fleischmann said he was standing on the third base side of the field near a batting cage, talking to Kelly, when the shooting began.
He showed scrapes on his arm and said he and other members who had dove into the dugout were bleeding from minor injuries suffered trying to quickly take cover.
Michigan Republican Rep. Mike Bishop said the shooter had them trapped.
“This guy knew he had us trapped. And he was positioned perfectly to make sure no one could get out of this place,” he said.
About 10 people had taken cover in the dugout, Fleischmann said, including the son of Texas Rep. Joe L. Barton, the team manager.
“We were scared because when the gunfire, when it didn’t stop, we thought, ‘Oh my gosh, he’s going to come in there. And we’re like sitting ducks,’” he said.
Meanwhile, Palmer and Kelly ran off the field and first took cover behind a large oak tree. “And then Scalise’s security detail said the guy was moving around that side. We took cover behind the big block building,” Palmer said.
Welling up, he praised the two Capitol Police officers for helping protect the members.
“The thin blue line held today,” Williams said.
Williams said he dove to protect colleagues and that is likely how he injured his ankle and leg. He said Barth, a staffer in his office, ran into a dugout and the two men basically fell into each other’s arms. Williams said Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake took his belt off and wrapped it around Barth’s leg. He was in the same ...
“It seemed like it went forever,” Williams said.
“They saved all of us out there,” the Texas Republican said of the Capitol Police officers who joined the members during the practice.
Georgia Rep. Barry Loudermilk said some members dove into the first base side dugout, and others ran behind it or outside the field.
“When I was running, you could hear the bullets … dust was flying,” he said.
“It felt like somebody dropped a big piece of metal. The next thing I heard was, ‘Everybody run! He’s got a gun!” he told CNN after returning to the Capitol.
Davis said he ran to the first base dugout but said he was “on top of other people” already there, so he fled to a nearby apartment building.
Alabama Rep. Mo Brooks also said he used his belt as a tourniquet to try to stop the bleeding from Barth’s leg wound.
And as he was laying “face-first to the ground, breathing dugout dust,” he weighed the risk of getting up.
“If you get up and run, you know you’re in sight of the shooter and he can try and take you out,” he said.
Brooks said he heard more gunfire and feared a second shooter had opened fire on them.
“To the far end [of the dugout] and to my right, I start hearing, ‘Bam, bam, bam, bam,’ and I look up, there’s a guy with a pistol,” he said.
“I don’t know how long that was, it seemed like forever,” Barton said.
After the shooting stopped, Loudermilk recalled, one of the wounded police officers went to Scalise’s aid, to where he lay in the outfield grass.
Loudermilk said he went over to where Mika, a former Hill staffer who has continued to work out with the team since departing for a job with Tyson Foods, was with an Alexandria police officer.
He said he prayed with Mika, who was wounded in the chest, and asked the officer if she had a medical kit and went to get it from her car. As he returned, medical technicians were arriving to treat Mika, so he took it to where Ohio Rep. Brad Wenstrup was treating Scalise.
Rep. Jeff Duncan of South Carolina said he was leaving practice minutes before the shooting and encountered the gunman on his way out.
In the past, Duncan said, people have looked through the fence and the shooter didn’t appear out of the ordinary from other people who pass by their practices at the field, which is set in a residential area in suburban Alexandria.
— Bridget Bowman, Alex Gangitano, Griffin Connolly and Rema Rahman contributed to this report.
MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin struck a softer tone toward the West on Monday after winning his biggest ever election victory, saying he had no desire for an arms race and would do everything he could to resolve differences with other countries.
Putin’s victory, which comes at a time when his relations with the West are on a hostile trajectory, will extend his political dominance of Russia by six years to 2024. That will make him the longest-serving ruler since Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and has raised Western fears of spiralling confrontation.
But Putin, 65, used a Kremlin meeting with the candidates he soundly defeated in Sunday’s election to signal his desire to focus on domestic, not international, matters, and to try to raise living standards by investing more in education, infrastructure and health while reducing defense spending.
“Nobody plans to accelerate an arms race,” said Putin.
His comments, which are likely to be heard with some skepticism in the West following years of confrontation, mark a change in tone after a bellicose election campaign during which Putin unveiled new nuclear weapons he said could strike almost any point in the world.
With nearly 100 percent of the votes counted, the Central Election Commission (CEC), announced that Putin, who has run Russia as president or prime minister since 1999, had won 76.69 percent of the vote.
With more than 56 million votes, it was Putin’s biggest ever win and the largest by any post-Soviet Russian leader.
But the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), a rights watchdog, said restrictions on fundamental freedoms, as well as on candidate registration, had restricted the scope for political engagement and crimped competition.
“Choice without real competition, as we have seen here, is not real choice,” the OSCE said in a statement.
The CEC said earlier on Monday it had not registered any serious complaints of violations.
Backed by state TV and the ruling party, and credited with an approval rating of around 80 percent, Putin faced no credible threat from a field of seven challengers.
His nearest rival, Communist Party candidate Pavel Grudinin, won 11.8 percent while nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky got 5.6 percent. His most vocal opponent, anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny, was barred from running.
Navalny, who had called on voters to boycott the election, urged his supporters not to lose heart and said his campaign had succeeded in lowering the turnout, accusing authorities of being forced to falsify the numbers.
Near-final figures put turnout at 67.7 percent, just shy of the 70 percent the Kremlin was reported to have been aiming for before the vote.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov played down suggestions that tensions with the West had boosted turnout, saying the result showed that Russians were united behind Putin’s plans to develop the country.
He said Putin would spend the day fielding calls of congratulation, meeting supporters, and holding talks with the losing candidates.
Chinese President Xi Jinping was among the first to offer his congratulations to Putin, but Heiko Maas, Germany’s new foreign minister, questioned whether there had been fair political competition.
Check out the link to the see Randy Hall's post here at NewsBusters!
Behar Rants, Trump ‘Would’ve Been Impeached Automatically’ If He Had Testified!
ABC's George Stephanopoulos to Moulton: What 'Sets You Apart' From Other Dem Patriots?
[See NewsBusters for more.] Another day and another 2020 Democrat with a high profile media spot to announce a presidential bid. This time, Good Morning America co-host George Stephanopoulos on Monday pushed Congressman Seth Moulton to be more aggressive in supporting impeachment. Stephanopoulos also appeared to minimi...
On ABC's This Week Sunday, guest host Martha Raddatz interviewed Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway; specifically focusing on the conclusions of the Mueller report. Raddatz told Conway "the President says there's total vindication. Complete exoneration. No collusion. No obstruction." Not surprisingly, Raddatz ...
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) says it “fought hard to overcome extraordinary fiscal constraints and operational challenges” during the 2014 fiscal year because of sequestration and the government shutdown.
Yet the agency, which enforces federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination, says it “met, partially met, or exceeded target results” in its strategic plan for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30.
The EEOC reported that its enforcement actions secured $296.1 million in monetary relief for victims of employment discrimination in private sector and state and local government workplaces.
That total was down from FY 2013 when EEOC reported it obtained a record $372.1 million in monetary relief.
The EEOC also secured $22.5 million in monetary relief for complainants through litigation, and $74 million in monetary relief for federal employees and applicants.
EEOC said its mediation program for private sector charges secured 7,846 mediated resolutions out of 10,221 conducted. The agency obtained $144.6 million in benefits for individuals through mediations.
EEOC filed 133 merits lawsuits on behalf of plaintiffs during FY 2014— almost the same number as last year. This year’s included 105 individual suits, 11 non-systemic class suits, and 17 systemic suits. Legal staff resolved 136 of these merits lawsuits for a total recovery of $22.5 million. At the end of the fiscal yea...
During the fiscal year, the agency completed 260 systemic investigations, resulting in 78 settlements and conciliation agreements securing approximately $13 million in monetary relief. Systemic lawsuits comprised 13 percent of all merits suit filings, and by the end of the year, represented 25 percent of all active mer...
EEOC Chair Jenny R. Yang said increased hiring at the end of FY 2014 and investments in technology have helped. While a hiring freeze and attrition shrunk the number of agency staff between FY 2012 and FY 2013, the agency hired more than 300 staff at the end of FY 2014.
Makes sense. Less people working, less people to sue / file complaints.
Argentina's UNSC Month Has Latin Groups, May Have Congo But No CAR?
UNITED NATIONS, August 2 -- The first thing people noticed about Ambassador María Cristina Perceval's UN press conference Friday on the Security Council's program of work for her month as president was that she spoke entirely in Spanish.
Of course, Spanish is not only one of the six official languages of the United Nations -- it is also the second most active language among tweeting diplomats, far outpacing French which France still claims is the language of diplomacy.
The second thing people noticed, beyond some long impassioned answers about Argentina's history, was that María Cristina Perceval was classy. Before and after Inner City Press asked about the Malvinas or Falkland Islands and the UN's ultimatum in the Congo, nearly all of the questions were about Syria, and all pointing...
When another journalist dared ask about the UN taking sides, in Iraq ten years ago and Libya more recently, many "correspondents" tried to shout the questions down. María Cristina Perceval on the other hand was classy, only asking that the question be "a bit shorter," making a small space between her thumb and forefing...
Inner City Press, after thanking Perceval on behalf of the Free UN Coalition for Access (in Spanish) and expressing hope that she do many question and answer stakeouts during the month, asked her if the MONUSCO mission checked with the Council before issuing its 48 hour ultimatum for groups to disarm between Goma and S...
The answer appears to be no: Perceval said the Security Council sets the mandate, then it is up to the Department of Peacekeeping Operations to implement it.
But, we note, when DPKO is handed over to a single country four times in a row, as with France, and has culminated in a person who represented France in the Security Council during the Rwanda genocide and argued for the escape of genocidaires into Eastern Congo, isn't this an invitation for problems?
María Cristina Perceval said the Council may meet on the topic in August; for now it is only in the footnotes. Yes, an invitation for problems.
Inner City Press had wanted to asked Perceval about its exclusive report of August 1, that France because of vacations says it will NOT be drafting a Central African Republic resolution this month. Given other officials' statements, for example the EU's Kristalina Georgieva, talking and writing about the plight of CAR,...
Inner City Press ask Perceval about another topic it reported on yesterday: the August 6 debate on cooperation with regional and subregional organizations. Would Cuba's foreign minister be coming, to represent CELAC? Yes.
What about the Malvinas or Falkland Islands, which at least one Permanent Member of the Council told Inner City Press will be a topic on August 6? Perceval was diplomatic, saying that is an issue in the Special Committee on De-Colonization.
As her press conference stretched past one hour, Perceval was asked about Edward Snowden -- by Voice of America, a media run by the US State Department, with John Kerry on the its Broadcasting Board of Governors -- and about migrants dying trying to get to Europe. This last question invoked the Argentinian Pope Francis...
Footnote: we conclude with this because we must: Permanent Representative María Cristina Perceval after being asked for stakeouts by the Free UN Coalition for Access, responded that its co-founder Inner City Press is "most present" in covering the Security Council.
Why then did the Department of Public Information and its partners, its UN Censorship Alliance, conspire to make a rule purporting to ban media workspace at the Security Council stakeout, most glaringly by prohibiting the work table present at the stakeout before and during the relocation?
When Inner City Press bought and brought its own table, at the beginning of the UK's month in June, DPI came and took it away. This issue must be solved. Watch this site.
Hemophiliac protesters, all of whom contracted HIV from infected blood products, demonstrate in Beijing, Dec. 1, 2009.
HONG KONG—Around 20 people petitioning major state-owned pharmaceutical company Sinopharm in Beijing for compensation after they became infected with HIV/AIDS have vowed to renew their appeal, following clashes with police in which three people were injured.
According to eyewitnesses and local media reports, three people were injured in clashes between police and petitioners at company headquarters Tuesday, some of whom were in their seventies and had traveled from Heilongjiang and Liaoning in the northeast, and Shandong and Anhui in the east of China, to pursue their comp...
They arrived this week at the Beijing head office of Sinopharm, the state-owned parent of the Shanghai Institute of Biological Products (SIBP), whose blood plasma products they say contained HIV.
"We came to the Sinopharm buildings with a lot of confidence," said one petitioner surnamed Liu, a hemophiliac who says she was infected with HIV by tainted blood plasma.
"We we expecting to hold talks with leaders from the SIBP, but as soon as we walked in, we were given a form to fill out by a police officer," she said.

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