AA Edit | Staines’ Killer Shouldn’t Walk

The rejection by the Odisha government’s State Sentence Review Board (SSRB) of the petition seeking premature release of Bajrang Dal activist Rabindra Kumar Pal alias Dara Singh, convicted and serving a life sentence for the 1999 murder of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons, is a welcome decision, especially as it departs from the current pattern of handling of convicts with links to the Sangh Parivar.

It may be recalled that Keonjhar district authorities had last year recommended the conditional remission of Singh’s sentence. The Board has rejected this recommendation pointing to the possible societal ramifications of clemency to a man committing a dastardly hate crime of leading a mob and setting fire to the jeep in which three human beings, two of them minors, were asleep, and then cruelly preventing their escape. Indeed, the crime is etched in modern India’s history in the darkest possible colours and has damaged India’s reputation all over the world. It also cannot be missed that Singh has already got the death sentence awarded to him by the trial court commuted by the high court to life.

A close observation of the state’s approach to hate crimes displays a disturbing trend. It is seen that those who critique the policies of the government are treated poorly, while those aligned with it are handled with kid gloves. For example, the court was moved to grant interim bail to Hindutva influencer Swatantra Bhardwaj in connection with the alleged assault on the father of a student activist during a protest at Jantar Mantar. Or the gang-rapists of Bilkis Bano were given an early remission by the Gujarat government. On the other hand, Umar Khalid, booked under UAPA, has not yet been charge-sheeted, let alone granted bail. No court has made time to hear the bail pleas of Sanjiv Bhatt, who fought the government and got booked under various cases. The cases of the accused in the Bhima-Koregaon incident, meanwhile, offer the worst examples of justice being trampled upon on the watch of the courts.

The Supreme Court is set to hear Singh’s petition seeking a direction to the state government to take an early decision on his clemency application. It will discomfit anyone with a sense of decency to see him walk out of jail.