Rajiv Gandhi case convicts: Premature release of life convicts opposed

Chennai: Opposing the plea of premature release of Robert Payas and Jayakumar, life convicts in Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, the Union government has informed the Madras high court that in view of the interpretation “Life sentence means entire life of a person” by the Supreme Court, these two accused cannot seek relief of early release. Manas Mandal, under secretary, ministry of home affairs, stated this in his counter affidavit filed. A division bench comprising Justices A. Selvam and P. Kalaiyarasan had on August 9 directed the Union and state governments to file their counter affidavits considering the long pendency of the matter from 2012 and posted the matter to August 16.

In his counter, Mandal submitted that the Union government filed a petition before the Supreme Court challenging the proposal/decision of the state government. In pursuance of the petition, the Supreme Court referred to list the petition before five judges, constitutional bench to take a final call on seven issues concerning the suo moto exercise of the power of remission of sentences. He said subsequently a reference from the TN government seeking views of the central government regarding the release of 7 prisoners including the petitioners was received in this Ministry.

The said proposal of TN government was examined in terms of the order of the Supreme court and the TN government was intimated that it would not be appropriate for the central government to act upon the proposal of TN government as the matter was still pending before the Supreme Court. The Apex court in unequivocal terms decided in Transferred case “the life imprisonment means the end of one’s life”, therefore, the claim of release on completion of 23 years or doctrine of merger of punishment has no application, in this case, he added.