PATNA: Former Bihar MLA Ranbir Yadav, who is the husband of a sitting MLA of the state’s ruling JD(U), was on Saturday convicted of shooting his cousin brother dead 28 years ago.
The district and sessions court in Munger delivered the judgment in the long-dragging case and pronounced Yadav guilty of shooting his cousin brother, Sunil Kumar Yadav, dead on December 12, 1988. Police took Yadav, who was present at court during delivery of the verdict, into custody and sent him to jail. The quantum of punishment will be pronounced on January 3, 2017, said public prosecutor Preetam Kumar.
The former MLA, who has been notorious for his numerous muscle-flexing acts of highhandedness in public, often wielding a rifle, said he accepted the judgment with high respect and that he would appeal for acquittal in Patna High Court soon.
“Everyone who knows of the incident knows that I am innocent. This trial and all this are the offshoots of the feuds within my family…” said Yadav, who was elected MLA as an independent in 1990 in Khagaria Assembly constituency. He was beaten in the next Assembly polls in 1995.
The twice-married Yadav’s first wife, Poonam Devi Yadav, is currently the MLA of Khagaria and belongs to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s JD(U). She was in court with Yadav when the verdict was pronounced.
His second wife, Krishna Kumari Yadav, who is the younger sister of Poonam, had contested the 2014 Lok Sabha poll in Khagaria as an RJD candidate despite warning from JD(U). RJD and JD(U) were rivals during the Lok Sabha polls and came together in an alliance along with Congress before Bihar’s Assembly polls in 2015. The three parties run Bihar’s current alliance government.
Yadav, who remains an influential politician in central Bihar and known for his proximity to both Nitish Kumar and RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, had shot to headlines in 2012 for brandishing a rifle to escort Nitish Kumar to safety in Khagaria town during violent protests by contract teachers.