18 October 1999 :
On October 18, the TADA Court, Chennai, had fixed November 5 for the hanging of the four condemned prisoners. The special court in Tamil Nadu communicated the order to prison authorities after the Supreme Court confirmed the death sentence. Prison officials in Tamil Nadu, where the four are presently lodged, said they were awaiting the outcome of clemency petitions filed by the prisoners to the President of India, K. R. Narayanan. "Until the mercy petitions are disposed of the four will not be hanged," Vijaya Narayanan, Deputy Inspector General of Police said.
The Home Ministry has advised state authorities in southern India to postpone the execution decided for November 5 of the three Tamil men and one woman, because it was scheduled for the day Pope John Paul II was due to arrive in India.
In his petition to the President seeking commutation of the death sentence imposed on the four, B. L. Wadhera, a Supreme Court lawyer, said that cases relating to the assassination of the Akali leader, Sant Longowal, and the former Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, have similarities as both were political leaders and were killed after they addressed public meetings. The Supreme Court lawyer drew the attention of the President to a recent Supreme Court ruling (in the case relating to the assassination of Longowal), wherein the court had modified the death sentence awarded to the accused (Gian Singh) by the Trial Court to life imprisonment. Wadhera said if for any reason, the President was not able to persuade himself to agree to commute the death sentence on all the four accused, he could at least do so in the case of Nalini, considering the fact that she had a little female child who had to be saved from "imposed orphanhood."
The Chairperson of the Guild of Service (Delhi branch), Mrs V. Mohini Giri, has also presented a similar petition to the President seeking clemency for the four accused. She said "As we enter the new millennium, it is important that we review the existence of the death penalty in our penal system. We must consider whether retention of capital punishment is in keeping with the ideals of humanism and non-violence of which India has a great tradition." She said several of the democratic nations in the world had abolished the death penalty.
