An Indian court on Thursday sentenced former Bihar chief minister and prominent politician Lalu Prasad Yadav to five year in jail on charges of a multi-million rupee corruption scam.

Yadav, a former federal minister whose Rashtriya Janata Dal party supports the ruling coalition, had been convicted by the same court on Monday along with 44 others on charges of conspiracy and cheating over a scam which first came to light in 1996.

Mr Yadav was chief minister of India’s state of Bihar when some 380 million rupees of public money intended to buy cattle feed for use by poor villagers was allegedly siphoned off.

According to Indian media, a special CBI court sentenced Yadav to 5 years in jail in the fodder scam case, and also fined him 2.5 million Indian rupees.

Former Bihar chief minister Jagannath Mishra, who was among the co-accused, was sentenced to four years in prison.

The 66-year-old Yadav, known for his often amusing oratory in parliament, was born into a cow herder’s family and is an outspoken critic of the Indian elite. He has always denied any wrongdoing over the so-called fodder scam.

His sentencing comes after political controversy erupted last week over the Indian Supreme Court’s ruling in July that lawmakers should be barred if they are found guilty in criminal cases carrying jail terms of more than two years.