Rajiv Gandhi Assassination: Congress Is Serious About Sonia’s Release Of Rajiv Gandhi’s Killers: The Congress party expressed its anger over the release of the assassins of former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. In fact, Sonia Gandhi’s family agreed to their release. But the Congress party has announced that they disagree with Sonia on this matter. They have announced that they will proceed legally in this matter. After the release of the convicts, senior leaders of the party spoke at a media conference organized at the party office on Friday.
“The opinion expressed by Sonia in this matter is her personal and not related to the party. Congress Party will never support the release of Rajiv’s killers. Even the Congress party has nothing to do with the opinion of the central government. The party will never agree with the Gandhi family on this one issue. We have been saying this since time immemorial,” said senior leaders of the Congress party.
The Supreme Court on Friday ordered the release of six convicts serving sentences in former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination case. The Supreme Court bench took this crucial decision after the Tamil Nadu government showed a willingness to release them and also got positive feedback from Sonia Gandhi’s family. The convicts Nalini Srihar, Robert Payas, Ravichandran, Raja, Sriharan, and Jayakumar, who have been arrested as accused in this case and are serving the sentence for many years, have been appealing to the court for many days for their release.
As the Madras High Court did not take any decision in this matter, the convicts filed a petition in the Supreme Court. The bench considered all aspects. After taking the opinions of all, including the central government, which is the respondent, the Supreme Court bench comprising Justice BR Gavai and Justice Nagaratna issued a verdict to release the convicts. In the same case, Justice Gavai’s bench ruled that the orders given by Justice Lau Nageswara Rao’s bench should be applied to the remaining six.
On the night of May 21, 1991, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu. Nalini, Santhan, Murugan, AG Perarivalan, Robert Pius, Jayakumar, and Ravichandran are accused in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case. In 1998, the Anti-Terrorism Court sentenced seven people to death, which was later commuted to life imprisonment. The bench commuted Nalini’s initial death sentence to Yavazzi’s jail term on her daughter’s plea. In the cabinet meeting held on September 9, 2018, the Tamil Nadu government took a decision to grant amnesty to seven convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case. It was recommended to the Governor. However, the Governor has delayed taking a decision on this.
The Tamil Nadu government has filed a petition in the Supreme Court to grant amnesty to the accused in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case as per the powers vested in the state government under Article 161. Nalini and Ravichandran also knocked on the Supreme Court to grant amnesty to them as per the decision of the state government. Meanwhile, one of these convicts, Perivalan, was recently released after serving 30 years in prison. The rest will also be released with the latest Supreme Court verdict.
