Chennai ,March 29: The Tamil Nadu government has rejected a plea for premature release made by S. Nalini, sentenced to life in prison for the 1991 assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, endorsing the advisory board’s view that she still had no regret for having committed the heinous crime.

State advocate-general P.S. Raman informed the Madras high court on Monday that the state government had accepted the advisory board’s recommendation to reject Nalini’s application, and had passed an order on March 24 to this effect.
Following this, a division bench comprising Justices Elipe Dharma Rao and K.K. Sasidharan dismissed as infructuous an appeal filed by Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy challenging a single-judge order asking the government to reconsider Nalini’s plea for premature release.
In its report, the advisory board said Nalini harboured and had been associated with the prime accused in the case, and was part and parcel of the conspiracy to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi  and 18 others. The board said while she had acquired more educational qualifications while in jail, it did not mean she had changed her attitude. Even now she does not admit her guilt and she has no regrets for her heinous act, the board said.
“Considering the social history, circumstances of criminal behaviour, degree of criminality, her case is ‘not fit’ for recommendation on premature release,” said the report.
The bench reserved orders on another appeal filed by Nalini against the order to exclude prisoners whose cases were investigated by Central agencies like the CBI from consideration for premature release.

J. Stalin