The Tamil Nadu government on Wednesday wrote to the Centre expressing its willingness to release all the seven convicts serving a life sentence in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, reported The Times of India. In a letter to Union Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi, Tamil Nadu Chief Secretary K Gnanadesikan said the state is ready to release Perarivalan, Murugan, Santhan, Nalini, Robert Pious, Jayakumar and Ravichandran, as they have served 24 years in prison.

Gnanadesikan added that the state government decided to remit the sentences of the convicts after receiving petitions from them. The state government can remit or commute the sentences only after consulting with the Centre, according to Section 435 of the Code Of Criminal Procedure. "We would also move the Supreme Court seeking it to review its judgment dated December 2, 2015, where the Constitution bench took the view that the word "consultation" means "concurrence", said the chief secretary.

This comes days after one of the convicts, Nalini, was given a 12-hour parole to attend her father's funeral. Gandhi was assassinated on May 21, 1991, by a suicide bomber in Sriperumbudur, near Chennai.