Kochi, Thursday 20 November 2008: The Kerala High Court suspended the sentence awarded to 13 BJP-RSS workers in the Ashna murder attempt case.

Justice R. Basant, while suspending the sentence, ordered that they be released on bail on their executing a bond for Rs.1 lakh each with two solvent sureties for the like sum. The court passed the order on an appeal filed against the verdict of the Thalassery Additional District and Sessions Court convicting them and awarding them varying years of imprisonments.

The fifth accused, Naroth Ramachandran, was sentenced to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment while the other accused were awarded five-year jail terms. The appeal said prosecution evidence was not sufficient to connect the accused with the offence alleged against them. The prosecution had not placed the real facts before the sessions court.