My first priority is to meet my daughter in UK with my husband: Nalini

Nalini Sriharan, one among the six convicts in the 1991 Rajiv Gandhi assassination case released on Saturday, said her first priority is to meet her daughter, who lives in the UK, along with her husband and co-convict Murugan.

Talking to the media after being released, Nalini said her first priority is getting the formal release of her husband and a co-convict in the case, from a special refugee prison camp in Trichy.

“I request the state government to release him,” she said.

Also read: Priyanka Gandhi asked about Rajiv’s killing when she met me in prison: Nalini

Family is the priority

She said their daughter was not in a position to come to India and, hence, they intended to travel to the UK to be with her.

“That is my first priority. My entire family is destroyed… I have to gather them in bits and pieces. We will approach the Sri Lankan High Commission for an emergency passport and documents so that our daughter can take us,” Nalini said. Being one of the four Sri Lankan nationals among the six, Murugan was taken to Trichy camp from Vellore Central Prison on Saturday evening after his formal release after 31 years of incarceration.

Fighting for release

According to her, she was not very happy when her death sentence was commuted by the then Governor Fathima Beevi in 2000 followed by an appeal made by Sonia Gandhi.

“Because three were still on death row. All along, all seven of us (convicts) in the prisons were fighting for justice for the three convicts,” she said, adding that along with A G Perarivalan, her family too had been fighting for their release since beginning.

Referring to the 2014 Supreme Court order, which commuted the death penalty of three convicts to life term, as a “significant chapter” in their “fight for justice” and release, Nalini said the legal process was often unending in each stage.

Thanking leaders

She thanked former chief ministers, late J Jayalalithaa and AIADMK’s Edappadi K Palaniswami, for the assembly resolution in 2014 and the cabinet recommendation in 2018 seeking their release.

She also thanked Chief Minister M K Stalin for taking efforts for their release from the first day he assumed the office. “Only because I got the parole from this government that I was able to fight in SC for my release,” she said.

Also read: Rajiv Gandhi assassination: Nalini says she’s innocent, ‘very sorry’ for Gandhis

Nalini said she would like to meet chief minister M K Stalin but is apprehensive about how it will be perceived. She said that she is aware of the chief minister’s meeting with Perarivalan and that she doesn’t want to cause any issues as had happened after that meeting.