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Laloo, Mishra granted bail by Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Monday granted bail to former Bihar chief ministers Laloo Prasad Yadav and Jagannath Mishra in fodder scam cases being tried in a special court at Ranchi.

A bench comprising Justice K T Thomas and Justice S N Phukan ordered their release on bail on the same condition as imposed in an order passed on December 14, 2001.

"In respect of these appellants, we passed an order on December 14, 2001 ordering their release on bail on certain conditions. The present case is another one in the same group of cases and we do not want to take any different view in these cases," the bench said.

The bench said, "We order their release on the conditions same as those imposed in the December 14."

The court repeatedly asked CBI as to why it wants to detain Yadav any further in jail as he had been already behind the bar for more than six months in fodder scam cases.

When the CBI could not give any satisfactory reasons, the bench ordered release of Yadav and Mishra.

The court on December 14 had imposed stringent conditions in the bail order warning Yadav that he would not indulge in any activity to gain political mileage or in demonstrations on his release.

The court had directed both Yadav and Mishra to execute personal bail bonds of Rs 100,000 each and a surety of like amount before the special court at Ranchi in Jharkhand.

While restraining the RJD leader from making any public comment on fodder scam cases to gain political mileage, the court had said that the accused would not attempt to influence the witnesses and tamper with the evidence.

Both Yadav and Mishra had surrendered before the special court at Ranchi on November 26 in a fodder scam case and they were subsequently sent to judicial custody.

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