Delhi HC seeks ED’s response on Amit Katyal’s interim bail plea in job scam

The Delhi high court on Monday sought the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) response on businessman Amit Katyal’s plea seeking interim bail on medical grounds in connection with the money laundering case related to the land for job scam involving Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad Yadav.

A vacation bench of justice Vikas Mahajan has scheduled the matter for hearing on June 7.

Katyal, an alleged associate of Lalu Prasad Yadav and his son Tejaswi Yadav was arrested by the probe agency in November after questioning. Katyal, ED in its case alleged, had acquired several lands from Railway job aspirants on behalf of Lalu Yadav.

Katyal had approached the high court after the city court declined his plea for extension of interim bail granted to him on medical grounds on April 30 and had directed him to surrender on May 1. He has also challenged the city court’s May 22 order denying him bail. In the said order, the city court while rejecting his bail stressed on Katyal’s long-time association with the RJD chief. The court had observed that Katyal’s footprints were spread across multiple transactions and companies wherein Lalu’s family is also “omnipresent.”

During the hearing on Monday, Katyal represented through senior advocate Kapil Sibal asserted that his client had undergone Bariatric surgery and thus required a specialised diet. Sibal underscored that his client had lost 10kgs.

In its first chargesheet filed in January, ED named RJD chief Lalu Prasad’s wife and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi and their daughters, Misa Bharti and Hema Yadav, among the seven accused. The federal agency, also named a “close associate” of the Yadav family Amit Katyal, railway employee and alleged beneficiary Hridayanand Chaudhary, and two firms AK Infosystems Pvt Ltd and AB Exports Pvt Ltd, through their common director Shariqul Bari.

ED’s case had stemmed from the case filed by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in 2022 under the provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act and Indian Penal Code (IPC) against the then Railway minister Lalu Yadav and others for entering into conspiracy for abusing official position to obtaining pecuniary benefits in the form of land parcels being transferred to his family members and companies thereof in return for appointment to the post of substitute (Group-’D’) under the various zones of the Indian Railways.