LUCKNOW, March 13 -- In a strange incident, a four-decade-old murder case file preserved in the civil court record room in Uttar Pradesh's Mau district was found to have been badly damaged by termites.

After this lapse came to light during proceedings in the Allahabad high court while it was hearing an appeal challenging the trial court judgment in the case, the court instructed police to lodge an FIR and probe as to who is responsible for keeping the records safe.

Acting on the court's directions, police registered an FIR against Vijay Pratap Singh, who was the assistant record keeper when the record was sent to the high court in 2018, for his alleged negligence leading to the destruction of judicial records at the city Kotwali police ...