Former Calcutta High Court Judge CS Karnan was released from Kolkata’s Presidency Jail on Wednesday after serving a six-month jail sentence for contempt charges, reported ANI. Karnan has gone to his home in Rajarhat, Kolkata, his lawyer told The Hindu.
Karnan had been appointed a Madras High Court judge in 2009, and was moved to the Calcutta High Court in 2016. The Supreme Court convicted him of contempt for accusing top court judges of corruption, but Karnan has maintained that he was being targeted for being a Dalit. The apex court bench had also questioned Karnan’s mental health on multiple occasions.
His wife Saraswati Karnan, who lives in Chennai, had told PTI on Tuesday that she and her elder son would fly to Kolkata to accompany him back to Chennai. “I found him in good spirits and health,” she said, adding that she last met him about a month-and-a-half ago.
Karnan, who had been absconding from May 9, was apprehended on June 20 from a house in Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu. To escape arrest, he had checked into resorts under false names and switched cellphones to avoid being tracked. The 62-year-old’s term as a High Court judge ended while he had evaded arrest.
On June 21, the Supreme Court had refused to suspend Karnan’s jail term and maintained that he must serve the entire sentence. He is the first sitting High Court judge to have been sentenced to prison.
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