Fodder scam: SC rejects CBI's plea against bail of RJD supremo Lalu Yadav

The Supreme Court on Monday tagged with pending matter a plea of the CBI challenging grant of bail to Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav in the Doranda Treasury case of Jharkhand wherein he was sentenced to five years in prison.

A bench of Justices Ajay Rastogi and Bela M Trivedi said it is not issuing notice but tagging the matter with the pending similar appeal also filed by the CBI.

Additional Solicitor General S V Raju and advocate Rajat Nair sought the issuance of notice in the matter but the bench said it will hear the matter together and was not inclined to issue notice.

The CBI has challenged the Jharkhand High Court's April 22, 2022 order granting bail to Yadav in the case.

Seventy-four-year-old Yadav is currently out on bail due to ill health after his conviction in various fodder scam cases.

The former Bihar chief minister was sentenced to five years in prison and slapped with a fine of Rs 60 lakh by a special CBI court in Ranchi in connection with the fifth fodder scam case involving embezzlement of over Rs 139 crore by Doranda Treasury.

Yadav was convicted by the CBI court on February 15 last year.

On February 21, he was sentenced to five years imprisonment and fined Rs 60 lakh in the fodder scam case.

Yadav had held the finance portfolio of undivided Bihar, of which he was the chief minister, during the period of the scam.

He had allegedly received kickbacks through the animal husbandry department.

The top court on Monday tagged the plea of the CBI along with the other plea of the agency in which it had challenged the 2019 order of the high court granting bail to Yadav.

On July 12, 2019, the high court had granted bail to Yadav in a fodder scam case relating to the fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 89.27 lakh from Deoghar Treasury on the ground that he has served half of his prison term of three-and-a-half years.

Yadav has been convicted in five fodder scam cases pertaining to the fraudulent withdrawal of money from Doranda, Deoghar, Dumka and Chaibasa treasuries in Jharkhand.

He was convicted in two cases for fraudulent withdrawals from Chaibasa Treasury.

Yadav was in prison in Ranchi since December 2017 before he was released on bail owing to his ill health.