HC gives deadline to CBI to dispose of case on fodder scam

Ranchi, Aug 30 (UNI) The Jharkhand High Court today directed the Special CBI Court, Ranchi, to complete the defence argument in 45 working days and deliver the judgement in 15 working days in the multi-crore fodder scam case that rocked Bihar in 1990s.

Special CBI judge J K N Tiwary hearing the particular case relating to Ranchi treasury from which Rs 27.33 crore had been siphoned out today got another extension, the third time so far.

Today, the High Court was of the opinion that Mr Tiwary should complete the case during the extended period for appointment of a new judge at this point might further delay the case.

The monitoring bench of the HC, comprising Chief Justice Muthuswamy Karpagyavinayagam and Justice Narendra Nath Tiwary passed the order while hearing the writ petition filed by one Rajeev Ranjan alias Lalan Singh.

Earlier, the court had directed the Special CBI Court, Ranchi to complete the argument in one month and deliver the judgement in 15 days.

The CBI today submitted its monthly progress report before the court as per earlier order.

Rakesh Kumar appearing on behalf of CBI informed the court that there were around 7,180 witnesses out of which 3499 prosecution witnesses had been examined and the remaining 3622 witnesses were yet to be examined.

There are total 55 cases in the scan. Two cases had been closed, as two accused--S B Sinha and G S Prasad--died.

Of the remaining 53 cases, in 21 cases the accsued had been convicted and 24 cases were in the evidence stage.

Five cases were on 313 stage (statement of accused persons), two others on argument and one case on defense stage.

UNI