BANGALORE: Murugan and his wife S Nalini, members of the LTTE squad that assassinated former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi at Sriperumbudur in 1991, have written letters thanking President APJ Abdul Kalam for pushing the Union home ministry to accept the former’s mercy petition.
But it will be a while before President Kalam will get to read their letters, because they have to pass through the “proper channel”.
The two are lodged in separate prisons in Vellore, Tamil Nadu. Nalini’s death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment by then Governor M Fathima Beevi in April 2000, but Murugan, G Perarivalan, and Chinna Santhan have been on death row since January 1998. Governor Beevi had rejected their petitions, after which they went in appeal to the President. Perarivalan is an Indian from North Arcot district. The others are Sri Lankan nationals.
Murugan, 31, has written to Kalam thanking him for the mercy shown to him and promising to lead a normal life on his release. Nalini, 40, has written a separate letter thanking the President for pardoning Murugan.
Though the Union Cabinet had recommended that the three murderers, among 20 other prisoners on death row, be shown no mercy, the President, in an unprecedented move last fortnight, sent the files back to Home Minister Shivraj Patil advising the government to consider pardoning them.
Murugan and Nalini were so happy on receiving news of Kalam’s recommendation that they wanted to send telegrams to thank him. But under prison rules they are not allowed to do so. So they were asked to write letters.
Perarivalan, 33, and Santhan, 35, too are happy that Kalam is inclined to grant them clemency but have chosen not to formally thank the President, a prison official told DNA.
Murugan and Nalini are hoping to join their 13-year-old daughter, Megara, who was born after their arrest and who is now in Sri Lanka. Only last month, Nalini won a legal battle against officials who have been refusing to grant Megara a visa to visit the Vellore jail.
