Lucknow, Dec. 9 -- A special court here awarded five years and six months of prison term to a man for lodging a false FIR under the stringent SC/ST Act against four individuals to deter one of them from pursuing a murder case.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs.10,000 on the accused, one Vikas Kumar from Sevai under the PGI police station limits, and failure to pay fine would result in three additional months of imprisonment. The judgement was given by additional district judge Vivekanand Sharan Tripathi.

Kumar had lodged an FIR on June 29, 2019, at the PGI police station against Om Shankar Yadav and Akhilesh Pal of Basti district, and Arun Kumar and his wife Neetu Yadav of Sant Kabir Nagar, accusing them of issuing threats and grabbin...