HC reduces sentence of former jail warden

The imprisonment of three years that was awarded to a former jail warden for accepting a bribe of ₹1,000 for permitting a person to visit an accused, who was in judicial custody, was reduced to one year by the Kerala High Court considering the age of the accused and other factors in the case.

Justice P. Ubaid reduced the jail term for P. Krishnankutty, a former jail warden of the district jail, Thiruvananthapuram, who was convicted by the trial court on a case registered by the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau in 1998.

The High Court noted that 20 years had elapsed since the detection of the case and the accused was aged 55 or 56 at the time of prosecution. “He must have now crossed 75 years. The amount involved is only ₹ 1,000,” the court noted.

The judge also noted that “on consideration of the various aspects, including the long lapse of 20 years since the initiation of prosecution and also the present age of the accused, I find that a term of one year in jail will be the adequate sentence.”

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