Ranchi: Eight fodder scam convicts, including an IAS officer and a former Bihar minister, who were sentenced up to three years rigorous imprisonment, by a special CBI court here today, were granted bail.
These eight are among the 45 convicted by the court of Pravas Kumar Singh in a case pertaining to fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 37.7 crore from the Chaibasa treasury in the 1990s.
They were granted bail as their sentence is up to three years, and the term is bailable.
The eight who got bail are IAS officer K Armugam, former AHD and Labour Minister Vidya Sagar Nishad, ex-BJP MLA Drub Bhagat and five fodder suppliers—Madhu Mehta, Bimala Sharma, S K Sinha, Rajesh Verma and Shiv Kumari. The court has also imposed fine on them ranging between Rs 50,000 and five lakh.
The judge fixed October 3 as the date to pronounce the quantum of sentence against 37 other convicts, including former Bihar Chief Ministers Lalu Prasad Yadav and Jagannath Mishra and ruling JD(U) MP Jagdish Sharma. In all, there were 56 accused in the ase.
The figure reduced to 45 after seven of them died, one got relief from the court, one confessed to the crime and others turned approval in the Rs 950-crore fodder scam, the investigation for which was handed over to the CBI on the Supreme Court's directive.
The 45 convicts include six politicians, four IAS officers, one Indian Revenue Service officer, eight Animal Husbandry Department officials, one treasury official and 25 fodder suppliers.
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