Too late to hang them, says judge who sentenced Rajiv killers

AIADMK had strongly come out against the LTTE after Rajiv's assassination, demanding a ban on it and that it be declared a terror outfit, but now, TN govt has taken an ‘arbitrary’ decision to release them— Minister of State in PMO V Narayanasamy

• ‘Hanging them now will amount to punishing them twice for the same crime’
• Urges Prez Pranab Mukherjee to review his decision to reject their mercy petitions
• Reconsider decision to release convicts, Narayanasamy urges Tamil Nadu CM
• ‘Decision of Tamil Nadu government is shocking, unacceptable, embarrassing’

Chennai: A former judge who headed a bench that awarded the death sentence to four men for the killing of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi said on Sunday that the convicts should not be hanged now. KT Thomas said that since Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan had spent 22 years in prison, hanging them now would amount to punishing them twice for the same crime. The three men are lodged at the Vellore jail in Tamil Nadu.

Thomas told reporters, "If they are going to be awarded (death sentence) after spending 22 years in jail, it would be like giving them two punishment for the same crime, which is against the constitution."

He urged President Pranab Mukherjee to review his decision to reject their mercy petitions. "The president should reconsider this because as of now the three have undergone a punishment more than the term of life imprisonment," he said.

In 1999, a three-member Supreme Court bench comprising Thomas, Justice DP Wadwah and Justice SSM Quadri awarded death punishment to Murugan, Santhan, Perarivalan and Murugan's wife Nalini.

Thomas dissented on death punishment to Nalini, whose sentence was commuted to life imprisonment after then president Pratibha Patil accepted her mercy petition.

While Perarivalan and Murugan are Indian citizens, Santhan and Murugan are from Sri Lanka. A Tamil Tiger woman suicide bomber assassinated Rajiv Gandhi at an election rally near Chennai May 21, 1991.

All four listed in the case were charged with contributing to the killing. Among those wanted for the assassination were the Tamil Tigers chief Velupillai Prabhakaran, who was killed in Sri Lanka in 2009.

Senior Congress leader and Minister of State in PMO V Narayanasamy urged Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa to reconsider her government's decision to release three convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case whose death sentence was commuted to life term. Speaking to reporters here, he said Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan had assassinated the Prime Minister and a leader of great stature and if they are released it will only set a bad precedent.

"The decision (of Tamil Nadu government) is shocking, unacceptable and embarrassing and hence they should reconsider it," he said and pointed out that life term meant they should be incarcerated till the end of their lives.

Narayanasamy recalled that AIADMK had strongly come out against the LTTE soon after Rajiv Gandhi's assassination in 1991, demanding a ban on it and that it be declared a terror outfit.

The party had also pointed out that LTTE supremo Prabhakaran be brought to India for trial and for deterrent punishment.

But now the AIADMK government in Tamil Nadu had taken an "arbitrary" decision to release them, Narayanasamy said.

He said the state government had no constitutional authority to take such a decision as the case was probed by CBI and the culprits were punished under provisions of TADA.

"This U-turn gives rise to suspicion that AIADMK is now seeking political mileage and eyeing the Lok Sabha polls," he said.

Narayanasamy also said he did not personally agree with the Supreme Court's decision to commute to life term the capital punishment imposed on the assassins.

"Merely because there was delay on the part of the Centre to take a decision on mercy petitions submitted by the convicts does not mean that the capital punishment can be reduced to life term", he said.

On February 19, the Tamil Nadu government decided to release all seven convicts serving life term in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, a day after Supreme Court commuted the death penalty of Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan.