Can’t order your release: Madras HC tells two Rajiv Gandhi case convicts

The Madras High Court on Friday dismissed petitions filed by S Nalini and R P Ravichandran, convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, seeking a direction to the Tamil Nadu government to order their release without the nod from Governor.

The first bench of Chief Justice M N Bhandari and Justice N Mala said the High Courts are not vested with special powers like the Supreme Court which invoked Article 142 to order the release of A G Perarivalan, one of the convicts in the case.

While dismissing the petitions filed by Nalini and Ravichandran, the bench said such power (Article 142) which is conferred on the Supreme Court to issue any direction to do complete justice in a matter pending before it has not been provided to the High Courts.

Nalini and Ravichandran, had in their petitions, demanded that they be released by the Tamil Nadu government without waiting for the governor’s decision on the 2018 cabinet resolution recommending the release of all convicts in the case.

After Perarivalan was set free by the apex court, the number of convicts in the sensational case now stands at six -- Nalini, her husband Murugan, Santhan, Ravichandran, Jayakumar, and Robert Pyas.

The petitioners also told the Madras High Court that the Supreme Court, in the Perarivalan case, has pointed out that the Governor is bound by the recommendation of the Cabinet to drive home the point that they be released without any delay.

M Radhakrishnan, who represents Nalini, told Deccan Herald that he will move the Supreme Court against the High Court dismissing her plea seeking release from prison. “We argued that it would amount to discrimination that Perarivalan has been released and co-accused Nalini has not been. Our prayer to the High Court was to invoke Article 226 which is wider than Article 142 to order Nalini’s release. But the court dismissed it. Our next stop is the Supreme Court,” he said.

While Nalini, Murugan, Santhan, and Perarivalan were sentenced to death, Ravichandran, Robert Payas, and Jayakumar, were sentenced to life by the Supreme Court.

Nalini’s death sentence was commuted to life in 2000 after Rajiv Gandhi’s wife Sonia Gandhi appealed for remission, while the capital punishment awarded to the other three was commuted to life by the Supreme Court in 2014.

The release of all seven was recommended by the Tamil Nadu cabinet in 2018.