Court has upheld charges we had levelled against Lalu: Sushil Modi

Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi on Saturday said the CBI court at Ranchi, by sentencing Lalu Prasad to jail in a fodder scam case, had upheld the charges he and others had levelled against the RJD supremo before the Patna High Court.

The senior BJP leader also rubbished the "conspiracy" allegation levelled by the RJD against his party in connection with Prasad's conviction by the court.

"In the PIL filed in the Patna High Court, Shivanand Tiwary, Lalan Singh and I had levelled the charges against Lalu Prasad with solid evidence. By awarding punishment to him, the court has upheld our charges," Modi said here in a statement.

The Patna High Court had ordered a CBI inquiry into the Rs 900-crore fodder scam in 1996. Among Modi's co-petitioners, Tiwary is now with the RJD while Singh is with Nitish Kumar's JD(U).

Modi also came down heavily on the RJD leaders for alleging that Prasad was a victim of conspiracy and vendetta politics, saying, "They should recall the political affiliations of former Bihar governor A R Kidwai, the then prime minister H D Deve Gowda and the then joint director of CBI U N Biswas."

"Kidwai, who gave the permission to lodge cases, was a staunch Congressman. Gowda owed his rise to the prime minister's position to Prasad's support. And Biswas, who took the investigation to its logical conclusion as a CBI officer, is now a senior leader of the Trinamool Congress," he added.

"When Prasad went to jail for the first time, his wife Rabri Devi was the chief minister. Who was conspiring against him at that time?" the BJP leader asked.

Prasad's wife was sworn-in as the chief minister, following the RJD chief's resignation from the post in 1997 when he had to step down in the wake of the CBI filing a chargesheet against him in the fodder scam case.

Modi also accused Prasad of having "come to power in the name of the poor" and later, betraying their trust by "looting public money" and added that "the judgment is a lesson for all those who try to justify their criminal acts by talking about the backwards, Dalits and minorities".