Nalini granted one-day parole

Chennai, March 8 (IANS) Nalini Sriharan, one of the convicts serving life term for her role in the assassination of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, was granted one-day parole on Tuesday by the Madras High Court.

She applied for three days' parole to attend to her father's memorial prayer.

The court granted her parole for 24 hours to attend her father's memorial prayer on March 9.

Last month, Nalini was granted 12 hours' parole to attend her father's funeral held here. She is lodged in Vellore prison, around 150 km from here.

Nalini was sentenced to death by a special court for her involvement in Gandhi's assassination at Sriperumbudur near Chennai on May 21, 1991.

The sentence was commuted to life imprisonment after Sonia Gandhi, the former prime minister's widow, petitioned for clemency -- for the sake of Nalini's daughter.

Nalini, an Indian, had accompanied the Sri Lankan woman suicide bomber who blew up Rajiv Gandhi with concealed explosives.

Nalini, who was a close friend of an LTTE operative known as Murugan, who too is an accused in the case, later gave birth to a girl in prison.