Saturday, April 28, 2018

Court dismisses Nalini’s petition for early release

TIMES NEWS NETWORK 28.04.2018

Chennai:

The Madras high court on Friday dismissed a plea for premature release by Nalini Sriharan, who is serving a sentence of life imprisonment for the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

A division bench of Justices K K Sasidharan and Justice R Subramanian passed the order, noting that the court cannot interfere in the matter since the issue has been already seized of by the Supreme Court.

Nalini, who is currently in Vellore Central Prison, had challenged the order of a single judge who granted the Tamil Nadu government the liberty to consider her representation for premature release, subject to the outcomeof the petition pending before the Supreme Court.

The petitioner, who has now been in prison for more than 25 years, said the state government in 1994 framed a scheme under Article 162 of the Constitution (power of state legislature to make laws) to release convicts serving life terms after completion of 20 years in prison.

Nalini sent a representation for early release to the government on February 22, 2014. Receiving no response, she filed a petition on which the single judge directed the state to consider her representation. Challenging the order, Nalini said there is no bar on the state government exercissing its power under Article161.

Refusing to accept the contention, the bench said the CBI assassination probe encompassed not only offences under the IPC, but also under various statutes enacted by Parliament.

The appellant was punished for various offences under central acts, it said. So thereis a basic question asto whether it would be possible for the governor to exercise powers under Article 161, in view of Article 162 restricting the power to matters with respect to which the legislature of the state has power to make laws. Judicial discipline also did not allow a high court to decide a matter involving the same parties and same issue pending beforethe apex court,itsaid.

PENDING IN TOP COURT

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