Thiruvananthapuram: A day after his arrest, Kerala IAS officer Sriram Venkitaraman, who allegedly drove a car in an “intoxicated” state and fatally knocked down a journalist, was on Sunday shifted to the “remand cell” in the Government Medical College Hospital here, police said.
The officer was moved to the medical college hospital after pressure mounted on the state government with the victim’s family raising fears about the course of the probe and the journalist fraternity in the state alleging he was being extended five-star facilities despite being remanded to judicial custody.
The Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ) threatened to stage a protest in front of the KIMS Hospital, where the officer had got himself admitted soon after the accident in the early hours of Saturday.
Venkitaraman was arrested on Saturday night, nearly 17 hours after the accident that triggered an outrage and later remanded to 14 days judicial custody by a magistrate who visited him at the KIMS Hospital.
On Sunday evening, amid tight security and high drama, Venkitaraman was brought out of the private hospital in a stretcher with a face mask after being discharged.
The 33-year-old officer, seen lying motionless on the stretcher with his spectacles on, was wheeled into a hi-tech ambulance and first taken to the residence of Judicial First Class Magistrate Amal S R.
The magistrate examined the medical reports and the accused inside the ambulance and directed that the officer be taken to the district jail at nearby Poojappura.
“Magistrate ordered him to be shifted to the jail. Over there, the prison authorities will take a call whether Venkitaraman needs to be shifted to medical college or not,” IGPand Thiruvananthapuram Police Commissioner Dinendra Kashyap told PTI then. (PTI)
