A stunned Lalu Yadav was jailed today after a CBI court in Ranchi found him and 15 others guilty of corruption in a fodder scam case when he was chief minister of Bihar. Six others, including former chief minister Jagannath Mishra, were acquitted.
The court will rule on the jail sentence on January 3. Lalu Yadav’s party Rashtriya Janata Dal, which will be led by Lalu’s younger son, Tejashwi Yadav, called the case “a tragedy of errors”.
The judgment came on the same day the Enforcement Directorate filed charges against Lalu Yadav’s daughter Misa Bharti for money laundering. As he stood in the witness box with the 24 other accused, Lalu Yadav’s hopes of an acquittal rose when Special CBI judge Shivapal Singh declared that six accused including Jagannath Mishra stood acquitted.
While the six were moving out of the witness box, Lalu Yadav looked a little confused about what had just happened. This is when his lawyer explained that the judge had found him guilty.
Lalu Yadav was immediately taken into custody and after completing the formalities, driven to the local jail. In October 2013 when he was first convicted in a related fodder scam case, he had to spend two months in jail before he got bail from the Supreme Court.
