Former Indian cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu jailed for Road Rage Death

Navjot Singh Sidhu

India's top court has sentenced cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu to one year in prison in a decades-old road rage case.

The Supreme Court ruled that Sidhu "intentionally caused hurt" to Gurnam Singh, who was 65, resulting in his death in the incident in 1988.

The former MP was acquitted of the more serious charge of manslaughter in 2018 - that still stands.

But the jail sentence is a serious setback for his political career.

Sidhu recently resigned as the Congress party's chief in Punjab after his party was wiped out in state assembly elections.

He has limited legal options left as he can appeal against the ruling only once in the form of a curative petition.

The case timeline

Sidhu was first accused of manslaughter in 1988 when a 65-year-old man died hours after an argument with him in Patiala.

He was India's opening batsman at the time and a rising star in his fledging international cricket career.

The case continued to be heard in a trial court. In 1999, the court acquitted Sidhu.

The state appealed against the acquittal in the high court, which convicted him for manslaughter in 2006. This forced him to resign from his parliamentary seat of Amritsar as Indian laws do not allow convicted individuals to be public representatives.

He appealed against the verdict in the Supreme Court which stayed the conviction, allowing him to retake his seat in a by-election. In 2018, the top court acquitted him in the manslaughter case, but found him guilty of "hurting the victim" and asked him to pay a fine of 1,000 rupees ($13; £10).

The victim's family appealed against the ruling and on Thursday, the Supreme Court added a one-year sentence to the fine.
 

Source: BBC