UCANews
The government in eastern India’s Odisha state has released a man serving a life term for the murder of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons, reportedly considering his “good conduct” in jail.
The government, led by the Hindu-leaning Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), released Mahendra Hembram, 51, on April 16 after he had spent 25 years in prison.
Keonjhar district prison authorities gave Hembram a cordial farewell and, garlanded him in recognition of his good conduct in jail, reports said.
“The Christian community in Odisha is shocked over the news of his pre-mature release,” said Father Ajay Singh, a lawyer and activist belonging the archdiocese of Cuttack–Bhubaneswar in the state.
Singh told UCA News on April 17 that the release of Hembram, who murdered a missionary and his two sons, “will set a horrible precedent.”
Hembram was given life in prison for assisting Dara Singh, the main culprit, who burnt alive Staines and his two minor sons — Philip (aged 10) and Timothy (aged 6) — on Jan. 22, 1999, in the Koenjhar district of eastern Odisha state. The missionary and the children were sleeping inside their vehicle in the remote village.
Granting remission to Hembram’s jail sentence “is an affront to the constitutional value system as his crime was very gruesome,” Singh said. “What message is this giving to society?” he asked.
Singh said, “The move seems to pave way for the release of Dara Singh, the main culprit behind the gruesome triple murders.”
Dara Singh approached the Supreme Court, the top court in India, in July 2024 seeking remission of life in jail punishment.
Singh, a member of the right-wing Hindu organization Bajarang Dal, was accused of unleashing anti-Christian violence in many parts of India.
The right-wing Hindu organizations support the BJP of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which came to power in Odisha in June last year.
Hembram told reporters after he came out of jail that he had spent 25 years in jail “falsely implicated” in what he called as “an incident related to religious conversion.”
India‘s state governments can enact remission policies allowing convicted persons to be released early from prison.
Image: Graham Staines and family. Image credit: UCAN
UCAnews is Union of Catholic Asia News