Nimisha Death Row : Centre Tells SC It Has Reached Diplomatic Limit, Nothing Much Government Do
New Delhi : The central government on Monday informed the Supreme Court that it has limited options to secure the release or prevent the execution of Nimisha Priya, the Kerala nurse scheduled to be executed in Yemen on July 16. It categorically said that paying “blood money” is the only remaining option.
Attorney General R Venkataramani, representing the Centre in the Supreme Court during the hearing of a last-minute plea for government intervention, said there is only so far India can go in the matter, and the government has already reached that limit. There’s nothing much the government can do. Looking at the sensitivity of Yemen, it’s not diplomatically recognised. Blood money is a private negotiation, Venkataramani said.
Nimisha Priya, a native of Kerala’s Palakkad district, is accused of drugging and murdering her local business partner, Talal Abdo Mehdi, a Yemeni national, with the help of another nurse. However, since the location falls within a Houthi-controlled Sana and due to diplomatic hurdles, government agencies and organisations working for her release have been unable to make any breakthrough.
There’s a point till which the government of India can go. We have reached that. Yemen is not like any other part of the world. We are trying at a private level, some Sheikh, influential people there, all that is being done,” the Attorney General told the court. According to reports, the family of the murdered man is unwilling to accept blood money, which is arguably the only option to prevent the impending execution.
Nimisha Priya was working in Yemen as a nurse since 2008. She travelled to the country with her husband Tommy Thomas after their marriage in 2011. Due to the civil war in Yemen in 2014, her husband returned to Kerala with their daughter, while Nimisha stayed in Yemen.
She later partnered with the Yemeni national to open a nursing home. According to her, the act was committed in self-defense and under duress, alleging that he physically abused her, took possession of her passport, and controlled her finances. Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Sunday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, urging him to intervene immediately to save Nimisha Priya’s life.