The Khallikote Additional Judge Court on Thursday convicted five accused in the 2014 murder of a television journalist Tarun Acharya and sentenced them to life imprisonment.
The convicts were Santosh Maharana, Sibaram Nayak, Shyam Sundar Prusty and contract killers Suresh Chandra Sahu and Ramesh Reddy.
The court awarded the sentence after cross-examining 45 witnesses in connection with the case.
A total of six persons including journalist Sibaram Nayak were involved in the murder of the scribe. While five accused were arrested by police , one of the contract killers Nrusingha Panda is absconding.
The Crime Branch was investigating the case from 2015 on the orders of the Orissa High Court.
Acharya, who was a journalist with an Odia news channel, was killed on May 27, 2014 for his report on use of child labour in the cashew processing factory of Prusty.
Later, Prusty had hired three contract killers to eliminate Acharya.