New Delhi: The Supreme Court Wednesday pulled up the Odisha government for not taking a decision on the remission plea of Ravindra Pal alias Dara Singh, who is serving life sentence for the murder of Australian missionary Graham Stuart Staines and his two minor sons in 1999. “You take a decision whatever you want to. Otherwise we will take our own. If you don’t take a decision, we will,” a bench of Justices Manoj Misra and Vijay Bishnoi told the counsel appearing for the state. “We can’t tolerate this avoiding taking a decision,” the bench observed. It noted that the matter has been adjourned time and again to enable the authority to take a decision on the plea of remission of sentence given to Singh, who has been incarcerated for a period exceeding 26 years.
The bench observed that when the matter was adjourned July 14, the State Sentence Review Board was in the process of taking a decision on Singh’s plea. It said the counsel representing the state has now placed before it a letter of the Director ate of Prisons and Correctional Services addressed to the lawyer and stating that a report from the Kendujhar district jail is yet to be received. “We are not informed about the decision of the Sentence Review Board,” the top court said. While posting the matter for September 2, the bench said the board should take a decision and apprise the court. “We are not concerned about how you are communicating, to what authority you are communicating. You just take a decision,” the bench observed. The bench said, “But don’t try to dodge us by giving us the letter… How is it relevant? It is the board which has to take a decision.” Singh, 63, approached the top court in 2024 seeking premature release.
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