Top court directed that Lalu’s long-pending appeal be decided within six months
In a significant legal reprieve for Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad Yadav, the Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to cancel the bail granted to him in the Deoghar fodder scam case, bringing an end to the Central Bureau of Investigation‘s (CBI) challenge against the Jharkhand High Court’s 2019 order.
A Bench comprising Justices M.M. Sundresh and P.B. Varale declined to interfere with the High Court’s decision to suspend Yadav’s sentence. At the same time, the court asked the Jharkhand High Court to expedite the hearing of the criminal appeal, preferably within six months, noting that the matter has remained pending since 2018.
The CBI had argued that the High Court wrongly granted bail by concluding that Yadav had completed half of his sentence. According to the agency, the calculation was legally flawed because the sentences awarded in different fodder scam cases should not have been treated as running concurrently at that stage.
Representing the CBI, Additional Solicitor General S.V. Raju contended that the High Court had relied on an incorrect interpretation while suspending Yadav’s sentence. He also argued that two earlier requests for suspension had already been rejected before the third application was allowed.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Lalu Prasad Yadav, opposed the CBI’s arguments and maintained that the High Court had exercised its discretion using the same standard applied in similar cases where convicts had completed half of their sentence.
After hearing both sides, the Supreme Court chose not to reopen the issue of bail, observing that nearly seven years had elapsed since the High Court’s order. However, it left the larger legal question regarding the computation of sentences open for consideration in an appropriate case.
The Deoghar treasury case is one of several cases arising from the multi-crore fodder scam involving fraudulent withdrawals from the Bihar animal husbandry department during the 1990s. Lalu Prasad Yadav was convicted by a special CBI court, and the Jharkhand High Court suspended his sentence and granted him bail in July 2019 pending the outcome of his appeal.
With Tuesday’s ruling, Lalu Prasad Yadav retains his bail, while the focus now shifts to the Jharkhand High Court, which has been requested to conclude the appeal proceedings within six months.
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Disgusting judicial system in India