Chennai: There seems to be a difference of opinion between long time allies the DMK and the Congress over the release of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi convicts.
While Chief Minister M K Stalin has written a letter to President Ram Nath Kovind asking him to release the convicts, Tamilnadu Congress Committee president K S Alagiri has said that his party does not agree with their release.
Even as Rajiv Gandhi’s death anniversary is observed today, Alagiri has said that his party will not accept the release of the seven convicts just because they are Tamils.
In his letter to the President, Stalin asked him to accept the recommendation made by the State government in 2018.
“These seven persons have already suffered untold hardship and agony in the past three decades and have paid a heavy price. There has already been an inordinate delay in the consideration of their pleas for remission. In the present circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic, courts are also recognising the need to decongest prisons,” Stalin said.
He requested the President to kindly accept the recommendation of the State government and pass appropriate orders for remission of life sentences of all the seven convicts and direct their immediate release.
Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated on 21 May 1991 at Sriperumbudur near here by a woman suicide bomber, Dhanu, at an election rally of the Congress party.