Lecturer, parents convicted for hiding they are Sri Lankans

A Madurai court has sentenced to nine years imprisonment a temporary lecturer of the Madurai Kamaraj University College and his parents for hiding the fact that they were Sri Lankan citizens, purchasing properties in India and claiming to be Indians. 

The direction was given yesterday by Judicial Magistrate Uma Mahesari, who sentenced Jacob Savarimuthu (66), his wife Mary Agnes (65) and their son Rohan Savarimuthu under the Passports Act, sections 120 B (Criminal conspiracy) and IPC 476 (Counterfeiting device or mark used for authenticating docu­ments other than those described in section 467, or possessing counterfeit marked material). 

The court also slapped a fine of Rs 3,000 on each of them. Jacob Savarimuthu and his wife Mary Agnes had come to India more than 15 years ago from Belgium, where they had been Sri Lankan refugees, police said. 

In Madurai, they had rented a house in the city and stayed there instead of staying at the refugeee camp, they said. After initially declaring themselves to be Sri Lankan refugees when admitting their son Rohan Savarimuthu to a school in Kodaikanal, they had claimed to be Indian citizens when they had shifted him to a school in Madurai, police said. 

Rohan had married Indian citizen Mary Praveena in 2003 and then joined the American College in the city as a temporary lecturer. He later joined the MKU College as a temporary lecturer of English, police said. 

Rohan and his parents were arrested in May 2008 following a complaint of alleged harassment from Rohan’s wife. Rohan had also claimed to be an Indian citizen and had bought properties, cheating the Government in the process, police said. - PTI