Court accepts CBI's plea on Bihar NGO scam accused

A CBI court here today ordered that 17 people, named as accused in the multi-million Srijan scam involving an NGO based in Bhagalpur district of Bihar, be kept in judicial custody at the central jail there till October 17.
The order was passed by Judicial Magistrate Kumari Vijaya following a prayer by the probe agency that all the accused produced before the court here be kept at Bhagalpur Central Jail, where they are currently lodged, "because of reasons pertaining to security and ease of investigation".
Those who were produced in the CBI court today included key accused Sarita Jha, manager of Srijan Mahila Sahyog Sansthan; Satish Kumar Jha, an auditor with the NGO; Vanshidhar Jha, who ran his own printing press in Bhagalpur, and a number of other persons including bank officials and personnel posted in the district administration.

The scam, which involves illegal transfer of crores of rupees from the treasury to the NGO, had come to light earlier this year and triggered a political controversy as its founder Manorama Devi is known to be close to a number of political heavyweights in Bihar.
The Nitish Kumar government recommended a CBI probe into the irregularities following which an FIR was lodged by the investigating agency here on August 25.
A controversy had erupted a week ahead of CBI's FIR with the death of Mahesh Mandal, one of the main accused in the case, who was undergoing treatment at a hospital while in judicial custody.