Lalu gets 3-1/2 years jail in fodder scam case

Ranchi: RJD supremo Lalu Prasad was on Saturday sentenced to three-and-a- half-years jail in a fodder scam case.

Special CBI judge Shivpal Singh announced the sentence after hearing arguments on the quantum of sentencing.

The sentence was pronounced through video conferencing. As the CBI judge was speaking, Lalu Prasad, who is presently lodged in the Central Jail here, was standing with folded hands.

The court also slapped Rs 5 lakh fine on the former Bihar Chief Minister. If the fine is not deposited, he will have to stay in jail for another six months.

The court convicted Lalu Prasad and 15 others on December 23 in the case relating to the multi-million-rupee scam.

The sentences range from three-and-a-half-years to seven years imprisonment. The maximum fine imposed was Rs 10 lakh, slapped on three convicts including Jagdish Sharma, former Public Accounts Committee chairman, and all got the seven years jail too.

The arguments on quantum of sentence had been going on since Thursday when those of five convicts were heard and another five, including Lalu Prasad, was heard on Friday.

While hearing arguments of quantum of sentence, the judge observed that the convicts "should be kept in open jail as they have experience in looking after cows".

The CBI court had acquitted another former Bihar Chief Minister Jagannath Mishra and five others in the case, relating to fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 84.5 lakh from the Deoghar district treasury between 1990 and 1994 in then undivided Bihar.

Lalu Prasad was the Chief Minister of the undivided state from 1990 to 1997.