Jharkhand HC dismisses Lalu’s fodder scam petitions

The Jharkhand High Court on Monday dismissed the petitions of RJD Chief Lalu Prasad Yadav to transfer one of his fodder scam cases to another special CBI court from the present court of Pravas Kumar Singh and examining one more witness.

The court of RR Prasad, who had on June 28 reserved the order on the pleas after Ram Jethmalani argued for Yadav, dismissed the petitions.

Prasad, who faces a judgement in a fodder scam case on July 15, filed the petition requesting transfer of RC20A case to another special CBI court as he did not “expect justice” from the present special CBI judge Pravas Kumar Singh following his alleged relationship with two Bihar-based JDU leaders, who are political opponents.

Appearing for Lalu Prasad, Jethmalani had argued before the court that the Animal Husbandry case be transferred from the court of Pravas Kumar Singh on that ground.

He also argued that that there were about 76 witnesses in the Animal Husbandry Scam but only 17 witnesses had been examined in the case and sought to examine one more witness in the case.

On June 24, Supreme Court advocate Surendra Kumar Singh had informed the special court of Pravas Kumar Singh that arguments on behalf of his client be stopped till an order by the High Court.

The CBI court has been hearing arguments for the last one month and had on June 20 directed 45 fodder scam accused, including Prasad, to complete arguments by July 1.

He has fixed July 15 to deliver the verdict on the RC 20A-96 case pertaining to alleged fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 37.7 crore from Chaibasa Treasury in the 1990s.

There are 45 accused out of 56 in the RCA/96. The rest have since either turned approver or died.

Bihar CID to probe into chopping off girl's hands

The Bihar government on Monday ordered a criminal investigation department (CID) probe into the alleged chopping of the right hand of an eight-year-old girl near a railway station in Patna last Thursday.

 Director general of police (DGP) Abhayanand ordered the probe into the alleged attack in a bylane near the state capital’s Rajendra Nagar railway terminal, after her mother met chief minister Nitish Kumar at his janata durbar.

 Dismissing the police version that the child’s arm had to be severed by doctors at the Patna medical college hospital owing to injuries she sustained when she fell under a train, the mother sought "justice" from Kumar.

 After he had heard her, the chief minister asked her to meet the DGP, who was present at the janata durbar, held as a weekly feature at Kumar’s official residence in a VVIP enclave of western Patna.

 Asked how she wanted the matter to be dealt with, the victim’s mother left it to the DGP to do whatever he thought was the best way to bring justice to her family.

 Thereafter, the DGP ordered the CID to investigate the matter after getting the full account of events from the complainant.

 Additional director general of police (CID) AK Upadhyaya, who was present there, told reporters the agency would probe afresh the woman’s complaint in its entirety.

 "Besides the allegation that the victim’s right arm was chopped off with a sharp-edged weapon soon after she alighted from a train at the Rajendra Nagar station late Thursday night, the CID would also go in the kidnapping of her brother Zulfikar Alam, 4, in May, allegedly by Bobby Khan and his men, in which the victim was a witness", Upadhyay said.

 The ordering of the CID probe came even as Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP) Manu Maharaj had cited preliminary probe findings to show the severing of the victim’s right arm came about after she fell from a train.

 The victim’s father, Ainul Ansari, had Thursday night’s attack near the railway station was the handiwork of Khan and his men who had earlier abducted his son Zulfikar, allegedly over a "land dispute."

 Ansari had also claim the family had come to Patna to seek the DGP’s help in securing the release of his son, when the attack took place.

 He had also claimed the assailants wanted to kill his eight-year-old daughter as she was the sole witness to her brother's kidnapping in May at Laheriasarai in north Bihar’s Darbhanga district, where Ansari works as a tailor.

Train hits auto, two dead in Nalanda district

A special train today hit an autorickshaw killing its two occupants at an unmanned level crossing in Bihar's Nalanda district, police said.

The incident took place at Dhibra halt when a speeding train hit the three-wheeler after it got stuck at the crossing, Deputy Superintendent of Police Mohammed Qasim said.

local people staged demonstration to protest the incident and sat on the track disrupting movement of trains.

2 passengers, 1 RPF jawan killed in Naxal attack on train

Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde has confirmed the death of an RPF jawan and one passenger aboard the Bihar train that came under Naxal attack.

The latest reports coming in from Bihar now indicate that three people have been killed in the attack on the passenger train. CNN-IBN reported that the dead included 1 RPF Jawan and two passengers.

No further details were immediately available.  The condition of the train driver is still serious.

Bihar nod to preparing DPR for Patna metro rail

Bihar moved a step closer to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's dream of a Metro train service in Patna with the state cabinet Tuesday approving the proposal to prepare a detailed project report (DPR).

Cabinet Secretary Brajesh Mehrotra told media persons here that state cabinet has selected Rail India Technical and Economic Service (RITES) for the purpose.

"RITES will prepare DPR for the Metro rail in Patna," he said.

Earlier, the state government had said that Metro rail would be a reality in Patna by 2016. The project is set to cover a distance of 40 km and is estimated to cost Rs.8,000 crore.

Rail projects in Bihar worth Rs 10,000cr delayed

A slew of railway projects in Bihar worth about Rs 10,000 crore are being delayed due to paucity of funds or for other reasons.

Most of these projects were allocated to Bihar during the tenure of former railway ministers Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad. They include Digha-Sonepur rail cum road bridge, among the three mega bridges.

Munger rail bridge and Nirmali bridge over Kosi river in north Bihar, which have already overrun the cost due to delay in their completion and escalation of prices of steel, iron, cement and other construction materials. The Digha-Sonepur bridge, which was to be completed at a cost of Rs 1,400 crore, would now be completed at a cost of Rs 2,400 crore, if everything went on expected schedule, sources said.

The railway projects across the country, which were to be completed at a cost of Rs 36,930 crore, would now need Rs 91,902 crore due to cost overrun, incurring about 148% additional expenditure of Rs 55,000 crore, said a Railway Board official.

According to sources, the fate of two major projects - the locomotive factories at Marhaura in Saran district and Madhepura in Bihar - has been hanging in balance and already delayed by about five to six years. Although railways is keen to complete them on public-private partnership (PPP) basis, no such step has been taken so far in that direction. Recently, railways invited global tenders for kicking off these two projects but to no avail, sources said.

Though railways has already visualized Bihar as the most developed state as well as an ancillary zone of Indian Railways by the end of 2015-2016, slow progress of major projects is likely to come in the way of attaining the target, sources said, adding that Bihar is to be developed as the main hub of all major component factories, including wheel factory, electric and diesel locomotives and modern maintenance workshops.

The factories duly approved by the Planning Commission and Railway Board for Bihar include the wheel factory at Chhapra (Rs 1,417 crore), diesel engine factory at Marhaura (Rs 2,025 crore), electric engine factory at Madhepura (Rs 1,400 crore), coach maintenance workshop at Harnaut (Rs 325 crore), DEMU maintenance depot at Sonepur (Rs 15 crore), goods wagon repair workshop at Sonepur (Rs 92 crore) and wagon repair workshop at Samastipur (Rs 33 crore).

Though the Chhapra factory and coach maintenance workshop at Harnaut have been completed, they are yet to be officially inaugurated.

Encephalitis kills eight more children in Bihar

Eight more children have succumbed to encephalitis in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district, taking the total deaths in the state since early May to 31, officials said Monday.

Two of the children died Tuesday.

A district health official said: "It is an alarming situation as the disease continue to kill children."

Muzaffarpur civil surgeon Gayan Bhushan said doctors and health experts were eagerly awaiting the onset of monsoon as the rains are likely to slowdown the spread of the disease.

Monsoon is likely to enter Bihar June 11 or 12.

Over a dozen children were warded in government hospitals and private nursing homes in Muzaffarpur, about 70 km from here.

The symptoms of this mosquito-borne disease include high fever, irritation and swelling in the brain.