The Centre on Tuesday pleaded before the Supreme Court not to commute the death sentence granted to killers of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi on the ground of inordinate delay.
The Centre claimed that the three prisoners on death row had no remorse for their crime and enjoyed a good stay in jail despite the 11-year delay in disposing their mercy petitions.
Presenting this line of argument, Attorney-General GE Vahanvati drew a distinction for Rajiv Gandhi’s killers — Santhan, Murugan, and Perarivalan — in order to exclude them from being considered along with 15 other condemned prisoners whose death penalty was commuted to life by the Supreme Court on January 21 last.
Speaking for the Government, Vahanvati surprised the Bench by saying that it accepted the January 21 verdict and denied any move to review it.
“The Government has accepted the judgement in its totality and will file no review petition. On that basis, the death sentence of these three deserves to be maintained,” Vahanvati said before a bench of Chief Justice P Sathasivam, Justices Ranjan Gogoi and SK Singh, that reserved its verdict on the set of appeals.
At the same time he pointed out that the case of the 15 was justified as the delay in those cases was “unexplained, unreasonable, and inordinate.” But in the present case, Vahanvati argued that the 11-year delay could be explained.
Soon after they filed the mercy petitions in 1999, Vahanvati said, a constitutional authority rejected it, referring to the Tamil Nadu Governor’s rejection of the mercy petitions as early as in 2000.
Even after the rejection, the three prisoners got educated through distance learning and participated in “creative” activities inside jail, including singing and dancing.“Where is the dehumanising effect from the long pendency of mercy petitions,” questioned the A-G.
He said that in 2000, the prisoners had known their fate and their attempt to file subsequent mercy petitions was an attempt to buy time. They were remorseless and in their own mercy petition they conceded that they intended to kill only Rajiv Gandhi, while distancing from the death of the remaining 15 persons, who were killed by the same bomb that took the life of former Prime Minister.
Accepting there was delay of 11 years, AG explained that a note on the mercy plea was prepared on June 16, 2000, without wasting time. The file remained with the government for four years. Without blaming the NDA Government, the AG sought to give a clean chit to the President office by stating, “I am not saying that government or this government did it. But can we say the President delayed it.”
On June 8, 2005, the Government moved a fresh note on the mercy petitions to President that remained pending till 2011 as representations from eminent persons poured in. One of the counsels for the convicts, Yug Chaudhary informed the Court that suffering is assumed when delay is established. He argued that the delay was “inordinate, undue and unexplained” and nowhere was it required to prove there was suffering or torture on account of delay in disposal of their petitions.
The Home Ministry finally reviewed its note on mercy petitions in March 2011 recommending President to hang the prisoners for the “horrific” crime. This finally led to the rejection of their mercy petitions on August 5, 2011 by the President.