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Apparently unable to bear the ignominy of conviction in a case of massacre of eight Rashtriya Janata Dal workers, a former Congress minister collapsed after stepping out from the court on Tuesday and died an hour later.
The former minister, Sanjay Kumar Singh, was taken to a hospital where he breathed his last, official sources said.
An FIR was lodged against Additional District Judge S C Srivastava after Singh's lawyers alleged that the court did not pay any heed to their repeated request to send the Congress leader to hospital when his condition deteriorated in the court room.
Earlier, Srivastava had fixed October 7 as the date for announcing the quantum of punishment after convicting Singh and seven of his supporters for the killing of the RJD workers at Pati bridge, nearly 3 km from Sheikhpura town, on December 26, 2001.
Abhay Singh, a relative of the Congress leader, lodged an FIR with Kotwali police station with a copy of a petition filed by his advocate Bipin Bihari during the proceedings in court seeking to send his client to the hospital as his condition had deteriorated.
His lawyer said in the petition that the former minister felt a severe pain in his chest and fell unconscious.
Bihari alleged that the court did not consider the petition and instead preferred to proceed.
Angered by Singh's death, some lawyers also ransacked the court and vandalised furniture. They alleged that the court did not pay any heed to their repeated request to send Singh to the hospital when his condition deteriorated in the court room.
The seven others convicted in the case were Arun Kumar Singh, Mrityunjay Singh, Diwakar Singh, Udai Shankar Singh, Kanhaiya Singh, Krishnanandan Singh and Shyamnandan Singh.