The Union government told the Supreme Court on Monday that it cannot do much more to prevent Yemen from executing Malayali nurse Nimisha Priya, Live Law reported.

Her execution is reportedly scheduled for Wednesday.

Priya, from Kerala’s Palakkad, was imprisoned in Yemen for the alleged murder of Yemeni citizen Talal Abdo Mehdi in July 2017.

The Save Nimisha Priya Action Council, a citizen-led initiative advocating for her release, had filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking measures to stop the execution.

The petitioners argued that under the Islamic Sharia law, there is a provision for release if the victim’s family accepts “blood money”, or the amount paid in compensation to the family of a person who has been killed.

The petitioners urged that diplomatic efforts be pursued in the matter.

The plea was heard by a bench on Thursday, which directed the petitioner’s counsel to provide a copy of the petition to the attorney general and listed the matter on Monday.

Attorney General R Venkataramani told the court on Monday that “there’s nothing much the government can do...”, Live Law reported.

He added: “Looking at the sensitivity of Yemen...it’s not diplomatically recognised...blood money is a private negotiation...There’s a point till which the government of India can go. We have reached that.”

Yemen has been locked in a civil war since 2014. New Delhi does not recognise the Houthi regime that controls the part of Yemen where Priya is jailed.

“Yemen is not like any other part of the world,” he was quoted as having told the court. “We didn’t want to complicate the situation by going public, we are trying at a private level...”

The petitioner said that they were willing to pay higher blood money to halt the execution, Bar and Bench reported.

The court will hear the matter next on Friday.

The case

In 2020, Priya was sentenced to death by a trial court in the Yemeni capital Sanaa. Her appeal was rejected by the Yemeni Supreme Judicial Council in November 2023. However, it kept open the option of paying “blood money”.

On December 30, news reports claimed that Rashad al-Alimi, who is the chairperson of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council, had approved the death sentence handed to Priya.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs had said on December 31 that it was aware of the situation and was extending help to Priya and her family in the matter.

Priya’s mother has been negotiating with Mehdi’s family to secure a waiver of the death sentence.

Priya went to Yemen in 2008 to help her parents, who were daily wage labourers. She worked at hospitals in Yemen before starting her clinic in 2015.

Differences came up between Priya and Mehdi, her business partner, after she questioned him about the alleged embezzlement of funds, her family has claimed.

Priya’s mother alleged in a plea that Mehdi tortured her daughter under the influence of drugs for years and held her at gunpoint several times. The plea also alleged that Mehdi confiscated Priya’s passport so that she could not leave the country.

Mehdi died from an overdose of sedatives Priya allegedly injected him with during an attempt to retrieve her passport.