M A I N   N E W S

Rajiv killers not to be hanged, asserts SC
Rejects Centre’s plea against commuting their death penalty
Legal Correspondent

New Delhi, April 1
The Supreme Court today rejected the Centre’s petition seeking a review of its February 18, 2014 judgment reducing to life term the death penalty awarded to three convicts in the 1991 Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.

“We have carefully gone through the review petition and the connected papers. We find no merit in the petition and the same is accordingly dismissed,” a three-member Bench comprising Chief Justice P Sathasivam and Justices Ranjan Gogoi and Shiva Kirti Singh said in a brief order without giving any reason. The three convicts are LTTE terrorists Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan.

In its February verdict, the same Bench had commuted the convicts’ death sentence, citing the 11-year delay in the disposal of their mercy pleas despite their repeated reminders highlighting their agony arising from the constant fear of being sent to the gallows any moment.

The apex court had rejected the government’s stand that they had failed to make out a case on the basis of their agony. “There is no obligation on the convict to demonstrate specific ill-effects of suffering and agony on his mind and body as a pre-requisite for commutation of sentence of death,” the SC had ruled.

The SC had clarified that the life sentence of the three convicts would be subject to remissions granted by the state government under Section 432 of the CrPC.

In the review petition, the Centre had contended that the convicts’ petition seeking commutation of their death sentence should have been heard by a five-member Constitution Bench, instead of three judges, as the case had involved substantial interpretation of legal and constitutional provisions.

“The impugned judgment is patently illegal, suffers from errors apparent in the face of well-established principles of law laid down by this Court and contained in the Constitution and other statutes,” the Centre had pleaded in the review petition. Further, if the SC had felt that the President had wrongly rejected their mercy pleas it should have sent the matter back to Rashtrapati Bhawan for reconsideration, instead of commuting the death penalty, the government had argued.