New Delhi: Nalini Sriharan, who was convicted for the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi allegedly tried to commit suicide at the Special Prison for Women in Vellore after a tiff with a co-prisoner, sources said. Nalini has been lodged in prison for the past 29 years.
Nalini, who is currently imprisoned in the Special Prison for Women in Vellore (Tamil Nadu), got engaged in an argument with jail authorities after one of the inmates, a 60-year-old woman, complained against her. When the jail authorities said they would transfer the woman to another block.
Late last year, Nalini Sriharan and her husband V Sriharan alias Murugan had demanded mercy killing.
Seven people, including Nalini and her husband, were convicted by a special TADA court for their role in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi on May 21, 1991 by an LTTE suicide bomber during an election rally at nearby Sriperumbudur.
Nalini is lodged in the Central Prison for Women in Vellore in Tamil Nadu, her husband Murugan (a) Sriharan is lodged in the Prison for male convicts in the same facility. Nalini and her husband are allowed to make two calls to each other every month. However, there is s case pending in the Madras High court on whether Nalini and her husband can make video calls to their family members who are residing abroad, in Sri Lanka and the United Kingdom.
The convicts were initially sentenced to death, but later it was commuted to a life imprisonment. Besides Nalini and her husband Murugan Sriharan, the other convicts are Perarivalan, Santhan, Jayakumar, Ravichandran and Robert Payas.
