The apex court verdict on Tuesday commuting the death penalty to 15 people which include four members of the forest brigand Veerappan’s gang, who are languishing at the high security Hindalga prison in Belgaum in Karnataka has brought cheers to their family members.
The Supreme Court in its crucial verdict has said the death penalty has been commuted to life on the ground of inordinate delay on part of the president to decide their mercy pleas of fifteen people. This verdict will help four of the Veerappan gang, Gnanaprakasam, Bilavendran, Simon and Meesakara Madaian who are facing the gallows languishing at the Hindalga prison since 2004 .
Veerappan’s wife Muthulakshmi was the first one to react about the verdict and felt much moved by the order. Muthulakshmi told The Pioneer over phone, finally innocent people got justice. She said, “I am happy with the SC’s order. Justice has been done. They are all innocent people and false cases have been put on them. I am relieved they will not be hanged.”
Most of the family members of the four persons are living in Chamarajanagara district in Karnataka bordering Tamil Nadu. Kamala Mary wife of Bilavendran said she was happy and her prayers were answered. She hopes four of them including her husband Bilavendran would be released soon.
The verdict came in a petition moved in the Supreme Court by four associates of the slain forest brigand Veerappan. Their mercy petitions were recently rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee.
The court said that a convict on death row should be hanged within 14 days of his mercy plea being rejected and the government cannot sit over mercy petitions for years without assigning proper reasons.
The verdict would mean that the assassins of Rajiv Gandhi and Khalistani terrorist Devender Pal Singh Bhullar would have to be commuted to life. Bhullar too had pleaded that he had undergone great agony for 11 years awaiting the President’s decision on his mercy plea.
Madaiah, Bilavendran, Gnanprakasham and Simon Antonyiappa were sentenced to death for killing 22 people, including policemen, in a landmine blast near Palar bridge on the Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border in 1993.last year, President Pranab Mukherjee rejected their mercy petitions filed in 2004.
It was argued on behalf of the convicts that their death sentence should be commuted to life imprisonment on the ground of an inordinate nine-year delay in disposal of their mercy petitions.
Venugopal a lawyer from Mysore who has been fighting their case told The Pioneer justice has been done to the four aides of Veerappan.
Madaiah’s son Paramashiavam said he was happy and his family will go to meet his father at the Hindalga jail soon.
