Showing his dismay over Tamil Nadu Government’s decision to set free all the seven people convicted in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, Congress national vice-president Rahul Gandhi said he was sad because in this country even PM’s family does not get justice.
“I am speaking from my heart. In this country even the PM does not get justice. This development has saddened me. I am sharing this with you not because he was my father but because they killed a former Prime Minister of a country,” Rahul said while addressing a crowd of people in Amethi on Wednesday. Rahul was just 21 when is father was killed by a suicide bomber at an election rally in Sriperumbedur, near Chennai, on May 21, 1991.
“I am personally against death penalty. But this is not about my father but about country’s prime minister,” Rahul Gandhi said with a tinge of emotion. Rahul also said that if a Prime Minister, who sacrificed his life for the nation, does not get justice how will a common man get justice. “If some person kills the PM and is released then how will a common man will get justice. It’s a point to ponder,” he said.
“I don’t believe in capital punishment as it won’t bring my father back. But it is not just a matter of my father or the family, it is the matter of the country,” he added. Tamil Nadu Government decided to set free within three days all the seven convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case after the Supreme Court commuted the death penalty of three assassins. Besides Santhan, Murugan, the husband of Nalini, Perarivalan, who earned a major reprieve from the apex court yesterday which spared them from gallows, Nalini, Robert Pious, Jayakumar and Ravichandran would walk out from prison.
Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, who took the decision for early release of the Rajiv killers at an emergency Cabinet meeting convened this morning over the issue, made a suo motu announcement in the state assembly.