Court dismisses murder charges against IAS officer Sriram Venkitaraman

The court acted upon discharge petitions moved by Venkitaraman and his co-accused Wafa Firoz, who was travelling with him on August 3, 2019, when the accident took place.

Thiruvanathapuram: The district sessions court in Kerala’s Thiruvananthapuram Wednesday dropped the charge of murder framed against IAS officer Sriram Venkitaraman, who has been charge-sheeted for causing the death of a journalist in a drunken driving case in 2019.

The court acted upon discharge petitions moved by Venkitaraman and his co-accused Wafa Firoz, who was travelling with him on August 3, 2019, when the accident took place. The victim, K M Basheer, 35, was serving as the bureau chief of Siraj daily.

As the district court dropped Section 304, which is a non-bailable offence with up to ten years of imprisonment, of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the pending trial would be held in a chief judicial magistrate court. The other charges framed against the IAS officer and the co-accused are under sections 304 A (causing death by negligence) and 279 (rash and negligent driving) of the IPC and sections 184, 185, and 188 of the Motor Vehicle Act.

Basheer, who was returning home after office, died on the spot after his bike was sandwiched between Venkitaraman,’s car and a roadside wall, just a few metres away from the Museum police station in Thiruvananthapuram.