A court has sentenced an Indonesian man to five years in jail for burying his newborn baby girl alive in a jungle to conceal the birth.

Ramlee Basaruddin, 38, pleaded guilty to unintentional murder after he buried the infant on Jan 8 in a shallow grave behind the house he shared with his girlfriend in Johor.

The girlfriend, a 20-year old Malaysian, had given birth earlier the same day.

The judge described Ramlee's act as "cruel" and "hideous" and handed down the maximum sentence allowed, the New Straits Times paper reported.

"I cannot imagine the level of cruelty in the crime you just committed... your crime deserves a punishment befitting its ghastliness and to serve as a lesson to society," Norsyahid Malik of the magistrate's court said.

Ramlee was also sentenced to an additional year in prison and four strokes of the cane for being in the country illegally.

Both sentences will run consecutively.