The mother and stepfather of a seven-year-old girl who starved to death were jailed for her manslaughter yesterday by a judge who branded their treatment of the child "chilling in its harshness and cruelty".

Khyra Ishaq died in May 2008 when her body succumbed to an infection after months of starvation at her home in Handsworth, Birmingham.

Mr Justice Roderick Evans sentenced her mother, Angela Gordon, 35, to 15 years and jailed her former partner, Junaid Abuhamza, 31, indefinitely for the public's protection, with a minimum term of seven and a half years.

The pair were cleared of Khyra's murder during a trial at Birmingham Crown Court last month but convicted of her manslaughter.

Both were also given concurrent sentences for child cruelty charges, which they had admitted, relating to five other children in their care and control.

The judge told them: "It is not right to say that these children suffered from neglect.

"Neglect is an inadequate and inappropriate description of the way they were treated. Rather, they were subjected to a domestic regime of punishment which was chilling in its harshness and cruelty.

"A regime introduced by you, Abuhamza, as it had its origins in your own upbringing, but a regime to which you, Gordon, became a party."

He told Ms Gordon her cruelty was "horrific" and made worse because she was Khyra's mother.

During the trial, jurors heard that Khyra was removed from school in December 2007 and subjected to a punishment regime which included standing outside in the cold or in front of a fan for long periods, having cold water poured over her and being beaten with a bamboo cane.

She and the five other children were deprived of food and prevented from entering the fully-stocked kitchen by a bolt fixed out of their reach on the door.

At mealtimes they were given a bowl containing carrots, beans, eggs and rice, or unsweetened porridge, to share between them.

The meagre meal would be placed before the children on the floor of the room in which they slept on bare mattresses, the court heard.

A series of photographs taken inside the terraced home were shown to the jury.

Pictures of cupboards packed with groceries, bowls of fresh fruit and a fridge full of food contrasted sharply with the shocking image of Khyra's skeletal body, also seen by the jury.

The panel was told that, by the time of her death, Khyra had lost about 40 per cent of her body weight and was so thin that her body mass index could not be measured on any available chart.

Mr Justice Evans said months of starvation had left her immune system "unable to resist infection".

He added: "It was infection resulting from malnutrition which led to the bronchopneumonia and septicaemia which were the immediate cause of her death.

"In real terms, however, she died of starvation in a house in which there was an abundance of food."

The case sparked heavy criticism of the social services in Birmingham and led to calls for the city council's strategic director for children, young people and families, Tony Howell, to resign.

A serious case review into Khyra's death by the Birmingham Safeguarding Children Board is under way.

Mr Justice Evans told Abuhamza, who suffers from schizophrenia, that, after the minimum term of seven and a half years has been served, his release would not be automatic, adding: "You will be released only when the authorities are satisfied that you no longer present a risk to the public.

"You now have some insight into your illness but it is limited and you are not compliant with your medication.

"If you were to be released from custody without acquiring greater insight into your condition or while suffering from a psychotic episode, you would, I am satisfied, represent a significant risk to the public of serious harm by committing further specified offences.

"The three psychiatrists who assessed you are also of the view that you represent such a danger and they urge me to deal with you under the dangerous offender provisions of the Act (Criminal Justice Act 2003)."