Patna HC admits plea against Lalu, Rabri

The arguments in the case were completed on February 18 in the court of Justice R K Dutta, who had reserved his order. Opposing the State Government’s appeal, noted lawyer Ram Jethmalani had challenged the “maintainability of the appeal of the State Government” and charged that it had arisen out of “political vendetta”. He had stressed that the prosecuting agency (CBI) — and not the state government — had the right to appeal against the CBI court’s verdict.

Arguing on behalf of the State Government, counsel Surendra Singh had pointed out that the public money was siphoned off through the fodder scam. It was the duty of the State to appeal against the acquittal. He had underlined that the CBI court had used the income tax appellate tribunal’s order and disregarded the evidences presented by the prosecuting agency to acquit the duo.

“This is legally not permissible,” Singh had stressed.

Earlier, the couple had even approached the Supreme Court contesting the State Government’s right to make an appeal in the case. The apex court turned down their Special Leave Petition (SLP) stating that it could hear the matter only after the Patna High Court admitted the state government’s appeal.

The special CBI court of Munilal Paswan had acquitted Lalu Yadav and Rabri Devi in the case in December 2006. The Nitish Kumar government filed an appeal before the Patna High Court 60 days later, in February last year.