SC to hear plea seeking shift of Shahabuddin from Siwan jail to Delhi's Tihar jail

The Supreme Court will on Monday resume hearing of slain journalist Rajdeo Ranjan's widow Asha Ranjan's plea seeking to shift former RJD MP Mohammad Shahabuddin from the Siwan district jail in Bihar to the Tihar jail in Delhi so that witnesses in her husband's murder case, killed in Siwan on May 13, are not influenced.

Hearing Asha Ranjan's plea on October 17, an apex court bench headed by Justice Dipak Mishra had directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to complete the murder probe within three months.

The apex court also issued notices and sought responses from Shahabuddin and Bihar Health Minister Tej Pratap Yadav.

During the last hearing, Tej Pratap had admitted that he had accepted a bouquet from one of the murder accused, but denied his involvement in the murder.

Ranjan (42), the bureau chief of The Hindustan, was shot dead in July this year at Phal Mandi near the Siwan railway station, barely half-a-kilometer from the police station.

The Bihar government has recommended the CBI probe into the case.

The case came into limelight again after a photograph appeared in the media showing murder suspects Mohammad Kaif and Mohammad Javed with gangster-politician Mohammed Shahabuddin after his release from jail.

Kaif, however, later rubbished all accusations against him and said he has no involvement in Rajdeo's murder case.

Meanwhile, a separate petition filed by Chandrakeshwar Prasad, whose three sons had been murdered at the behest of the RJP leader, will also come up for hearing before the same bench today.