ORDER :

In the early hours of 03.08.2019, a journalist on a motorbike was knocked down by a speeding car on the arterial road of the capital city of Kerala. The motorist Sri.K.M.Basheer was hit from behind by a motorcar, killing him almost instantaneously. The driver of the offending vehicle attempted to wriggle out of the situation by alleging that he was not driving and that the driver was a lady seated beside him. However, eyewitnesses identified a male as the person behind the wheels. Soon the driver of the car was identified as Sri.Sreeram Venkittaraman IAS -a civil service officer of Kerala cadre.

2. The police immediately reached the spot and took the driver of the car to the General Hospital, Thiruvananthapuram and thereafter commenced an investigation and later filed a charge sheet arraying Sri.Sreeram Venkittaraman as the first accused, and the passenger in the car as the second accused. The offences under sections 304 and 201 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (for short ‘IPC’) and section 3(1)(2) of the Prevention of Damages to Public Property Act, 1984 (for short 'the PDPP Act') apart from sections 184, 185 and 188 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (for short 'the MV Act') wer