The Supreme Court on Wednesday reserved its verdict on Constitutional issues arising out of the Tamil Nadu government’s decision to cancel life sentences the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case convicts, including the power of State governments to remit sentences.
A five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice H.L. Dattu would authoritatively deal with legal questions, including the scope of the Executive’s power of remission. It would also decide whether State governments also have power of remission in cases where central agencies like the CBI are the prosecutor.
The Constitution bench would decide whether the sentence of a prisoner, whose death penalty has been commuted to life, can be remitted by the government. The bench would also decide whether life imprisonment meant jail term for rest of the life or a convict has a right to claim remission, it had said.
The Centre had said it could not allow Tamil Nadu to “tinker” with the Supreme Court judgment and use its power of remission to release seven convicts whose death penalty was commuted to life imprisonment in the case.
The >Court had on February 20, 2014 stayed the >Tamil Nadu government’s decision to release three convicts — Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan — whose death sentences were commuted to life term by it on February 18, 2014 in the case.
It had later on also >stayed release of four other convicts — Nalini, Robert Pious, Jayakumar and Ravichandran — in the case, saying there were procedural lapses on the part of the State government.
The Jayalalithaa government had decided to set free all the seven convicts who have been in jail for 23 years for their role in the assassination in Sriperumbudur.
