31 Years After Killing, Freedom

Delay and dithering by high constitutional authorities have resulted in the Supreme Court putting an abrupt end to the long-running legal saga. However, Friday's verdict is not about innocence, for they are not innocent

- [e-mail]

Considering the judicial time it has consumed these 31 years, the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case ended one final time rather too suddenly.

Few expected the Supreme Court to apply the May 18 release order of A G Perarivalan and order all the remaining six to be set free, even though only two – Nalini Sriharan and Ravichandran – had petitioned the top court.

The order is a slap in the face of high constitutional functionaries who did not want to decide and, instead, sought to complicate it, though there was no confusion at all in the law.

Article 161 of the Constitution is an extraordinary sovereign power vested with the state government and a governor has no option but to affix his seal, perhaps after returning it to the cabinet once. A cabinet recommendation is all that a premature release scheme needs.