The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it is willing to change the judge conducting trial in the fodder scam, on a plea by former Bihar chief minister Lalu Prasad Yadav who is an accused in the case.
A bench of Chief Justice P. Sathasivam and Ranjan Gogoi said it will pass an order either directing the Jharkhand high court to appoint a new judge or will itself do so if there is consensus among the parties on the name of the judge who is to hear the case.
The bench asked the counsel for Mr Yadav, CBI and JD(U) leader Rajiv Ranjan, on whose plea the high court is monitoring the scam, to evolve a consensus on the name of the judge and posted the case for hearing on August 6.
In his plea, the RJD chief has expressed fear that he won’t get a fair trial as the trial court judge handling the case in Ranvhi is related to a senior minister in the present Bihar government headed by his political rival Nitish Kumar of the JD(U). Mr Yadav approached the top court after his plea was rejected by the Jharkhand high court on July 1.
During the hearing in SC on Tuesday, the CBI sought more time to file its reply.
The bench gave another week’s time to the agency.
The top court had on July 9 asked the agency to take a stand on Mr Yadav’s allegations.