The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the Odisha government to decide within a month on the remission plea of Ravindra Pal alias Dara Singh, who is serving a life sentence for the 1999 murder of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two minor sons.
On the night of January 22, 1999, a mob of around 50 people led by Singh attacked a camp at Manoharpur in Odisha’s Keonjhar district and burnt alive Staines and his two sons, Philip (10) and Timothy (6), while they were asleep inside a station wagon.
A Bench of Justices Manoj Misra and Vijay Bishnoi adjourned the matter to August 19 after the Odisha government informed the court that the State Sentence Review Board, which is examining Singh’s plea, had sought certain records that were yet to be made available. The Bench said the committee should take its decision in the meantime.
