The Central Bureau of Investigation on Monday filed a chargesheet against Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav in a case related to an alleged hotel tender scam, PTI reported. The chargesheet also named his wife and former Bihar Chief Minister Rabri Devi, their son Tejashwi Yadav and 11 others, officials said.
Last week, the CBI had questioned Tejashwi Yadav for over four hours in Patna and conducted searches at Rabri Devi’s house. Lalu Yadav is currently serving his jail sentence in multiple fodder scam cases.
The CBI had launched an investigation in the hotel tender case in July 2017, alleging that Lalu Yadav had used his influence as the railway minister in 2005 to award a tender to a company called Sujata Hotels to develop and operate two railway hotels in Ranchi and Puri. In return, he allegedly received a three-acre plot, worth Rs 45 crore, through a benami company owned by the wife of a Rashtriya Janata Dal MP.
The plot was also shown as agricultural land, which caused losses to the state exchequer as agricultural land is exempt from certain taxes. After Lalu Yadav demitted office in 2009, the shares of the benami company were transferred to Rabri Devi and Tejashwi Yadav between 2010 and 2014. The term benami refers to a transaction or contract held or carried out in the name of someone other than the person who has financed it.
The benami company’s owner Sarla Gupta and her husband – RJD MP Prem Chand Gupta – are among those named in the chargesheet, as are Sujata Hotels and its owners, The Hindu reported.
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