In a development that can prevent the release of Siddhartha Vashistha, alias Manu Sharma, the convict in sensational Jessica lall murder case, the meeting of Tihar Jail’s ‘Sentence Review Board’ scheduled for Tuesday was postponed till further orders. The meeting was expected to decide on the release of some prisoners, including Manu Sharma.
Sources said the meeting was postponed as Delhi Home Minister Satyendra Jain did not give his consent. Jain being the Minister in-charge is the Chairman of the Sentence Review Board and the meeting could not have taken place without his consent to attend it.
later in the evening, a Delhi Government spokesperson claimed there was no such meeting scheduled for Tuesday since the Minister has not given his consent in the first place. The Sentence Review Board is a statutory body which has a judge, Delhi Home Minister, law Secretary and Principal Secretary Home and Director General of Delhi Prisons among members.
The Board was to consider Manu Sharma’s release. last month, Jessica lall’s sister Sabrina lall wrote a letter to Tihar Jail authorities, saying that she had no objection to his release. A Government source, however, said, “The letter of a private individual has no legal sanctity.”
Manu Sharma, the son of former Union Minister Venod Sharma, was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Delhi High Court in December 2006 for killing Jessica lall in 1999. The trial court had acquitted him, but the Delhi High Court reversed the verdict and the Supreme Court upheld the life sentence in April 2010.
Jessica lall, who was tending a bar at the Tamarind Court restaurant owned by socialite Bina Ramani at the Qutub Colonnade in South Delhi’s Mehrauli area on April 30, 1999, was gunned down by Sharma after she refused to serve him alcohol.