The case pertains to the period when Lalu Prasad was the Railway Minister.
Former Bihar Chief Minister Rabri Devi and her son Tejashwi Yadav have been granted bail by the Delhi's Patiala Court in IRCTC money laundering case on Saturday. The court has declared November 19 as the next date of hearing. Lalu Prasad Yadav who was absent during the hearing owing to medical reasons will appear via video conferencing. All the accused have been asked to furnish a personal bond of Rs 1 lakh.
During the hearing, the court seized the passports of both Rabri and Tejashwi. The CBI opposed the bail of Rabri Devi, Tejashwi Yadav and two others and said that regular bail with hamper the investigation proceedings. The court had earlier granted them interim bail.
During the last hearing, the court had taken cognizance of the chargesheet submitted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) against the Yadav family. Besides this, the court had also issued summons to his wife Rabri Devi and son Tejashwi Yadav as accused.
The Enforcement Directorate in its chargesheet listed the names of former Bihar minister Prem Chand Gupta, his wife Sarala Gupta and Additional Member of the Railway Board BK Agarwal along with Lalu Prasad Yadav and his family.
Earlier in April, the CBI had filed a chargesheet against the RJD patriarch and his family in connection with its probe into the alleged irregularities in the 2006 IRCTC hotels maintenance contract case. The case pertains to the period when Lalu Prasad was the Railway Minister.
On April 10, the CBI had grilled Rabri Devi for hours in Patna in connection with the case.
In October last year, the CBI had also questioned Lalu Prasad and his younger son Tejashwi Yadav at its Delhi headquarters.
The CBI on July 5, 2017, filed a corruption case against Rabri Devi, Lalu Prasad and Tejashwi Yadav for alleged irregularities in the allotment of contracts of two IRCTC hotels in Ranchi and Puri in 2006 to a private firm.
The contracts were given to Sujata Hotels, a company owned by Vijay and Vinay Kochhar, in lieu of a bribe in the form of a three-acre commercial plot at a prime location in Patna district.
A preliminary CBI inquiry reportedly found that the said land was sold by the Kochhars to one Delight Marketing Company and payment was arranged through Ahluwalia Contractors and its promoter Bikramjeet Singh Ahluwalia, another accused in the case.
Delight Marketing, which bought the property from the Kochhars, was later taken over by Rabri Devi and Tejashwi, the CBI discovered.
After Lalu Prasad's family members took over the company between 2010 and 2014, it was renamed LARA Projects and converted into a limited liability partnership firm, the agency said.
Sarla Gupta, wife of Lalu Prasad's close associate Prem Chand Gupta and a director of Delight Marketing, is a co-accused in the case.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) is probing the money laundering aspect in the case and it had on July 27 last year registered a separate case following the CBI FIR.
The ED is probing Lalu Prasad and others for alleged transfer of money through shell companies.