A.G. Perarivalan was convicted of the assassination of the former PM Rajiv Gandhi, after spending over 30 yrs in jail, he has finally set free by the supreme court.
Perarivalan was born in July 1971, in Jolarpet, Tamilnadu, he was arrested in June 1991, at the time he completed his diploma in electronics & communication engineering. He was 19 yrs old then and was charged with providing two 9-volt batteries that were used in the bomb to assassinate the former Prime Minister.
He had provided the batteries to the mastermind behind the assassination Sivarasan, who was a member of LTTE (Liberation Tiger of Tamil Eelam).
During his long incarceration, Perarivalan completed his bachelor’s and master’s degree in computer applications and also authored a book named An Appeal From the Death Row (Rajiv Murder Case- The Truth Speaks), it was released in three languages Hindi, English, and Tamil.
Now Supreme Court on March 18(Wednesday) ordered his release considering his academic qualifications, good conduct in jail, his mercy plea, and medical condition.
AG Perarivalan’s Plea in Supreme Court
Perarivalan in his mercy plea before the supreme court had said that the Tamilnadu govt. had taken the decision to set him free but the governor of the state had taken a long and later sent the file to the President. Which is unconstitutional.
In the response, Govt. lawyer K.M. Nataraj said before the panel of three SC judges said that under the center’s law, the mercy of the convicted can only be granted by the President.
The three-judge bench has raised the question regarding this and said that this would mean that all the mercies given by the governors all these years will become unconstitutional? The apex court also said that if the governor does not agree with the state, he should have resend the file to the cabinet to reconsider.
There were seven convicts…
Former PM Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated on 21 May 1991 by a woman suicide bomber at an election rally in Shriperambadur, Tamilnadu, along with him there were 7 convicts, and all of them were given death sentence by a special TADA court. Later in 2014 SC commuted the death penalty to life terms, further the convicts filed the mercy petition before the apex court.
TN govt wants the release of all the convicts, earlier in 2016 and 2018 J Jayalalitha and AK Palanisami gov recommended to the then governors in order to release all six convicts. Now the release of Perarivalan also paves the way for the other six convicts.
