CBI Gets Time To Sanction To Prosecute Lalu Prasad In Land For Job Scam

New Delhi:

A Delhi court on Wednesday granted the CBI time till August 8 to obtain sanction to prosecute former railway minister Lalu Prasad and some officials of the public sector transport behemoth in a case related to an alleged land for job scam.

Special Judge Geetanjali Goel granted the CBI time after the central probe agency made a prayer to that effect.

The CBI had on July 3 filed a charge sheet against Lalu Prasad, who continues to be the national president of the RJD he had founded, his wife and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi, and their son and the state's Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav in connection with the alleged scam.

It was the second charge sheet filed by the CBI in the case but first in which Tejashwi Yadav has been named as an accused.

Besides the three members of the Yadav family, the federal agency also named 14 individuals and entities in the charge sheet.

The accused have been charged under Indian Penal Code sections related to criminal conspiracy, cheating and others in addition to provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The charge sheet came days after over a dozen opposition parties, including Lalu Prasad's RJD, resolved to take on the BJP unitedly in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections at a crucial meeting in Patna on June 23.

The case pertains to Group-D appointments made in Western Central Zone based in Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh during Lalu Prasad's tenure as the railway minister from 2004 to 2009 in return for land parcels gifted or transferred by the recruits in the name of RJD supremo's family or associates, according to officials.

The agency had registered the case on May 18, 2022 against Lalu Prasad and 15 others including his wife, two daughters, and unidentified public servants and private persons.

The CBI had filed the first charge sheet in the case in October last year against Lalu Prasad, Rabri Devi and others. It related to appointments made in Mumbai-headquartered Central Zone of the Railways.

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