The CBI informed a Delhi court on Thursday the sanctions required to prosecute three accused in the land-for-jobs case involving former railway minister Lalu Prasad has been received.
The central probe agency told Special Judge Geetanjali Goel the necessary sanctions in respect to Maheep Kapur, Manoj Pande and P L Bankar have been obtained from competent authorities.
The judge took the documents on record and posted the matter for tomorrow for deciding whether to take cognisance of the charge sheet.
The CBI had informed the court on September 21 that it had received the sanction to prosecute Prasad and sought time to secure sanction orders in respect of the three.
The agency had on July 3 filed a charge sheet against the 75-year-old RJD chief, 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.
Prasad is out on bail in this case as well as in fodder scam cases.
It was the second charge sheet filed by the CBI in the case but the first in which Tejashwi Yadav has been named as an accused.
Besides the three members of the family, the federal agency has 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 case pertains to Group-D appointments made in West Central Zone of the railways 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 the RJD supremo’s family or associates, according to officials.
The agency 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 the Mumbai-headquartered Central Zone of the railways.
The second 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.
