Neelam Katara said it was not term sentence but "life imprisonment with no remission for 20 years".
- Sukhdev Yadav to be released after serving a 20-year fixed-term life sentence in the Nitish Katara case
- The Supreme Court ordered convicts who completed sentences be released without review or special order
- Neelam Katara claims Yadav’s life sentence meant imprisonment for natural life, not a fixed 20 years
The order to release one of the three convicts in the infamous Nitish Katara murder case, has hugely upset his mother, Neelam Katara, who had fought a long battle for justice. The Supreme Court judgment that said Sukhdev Yadav alias Pehelwan can walk out after 20 years, she said, was a "complete miscarriage of justice".
"I completely agree that if someone's sentence is over, they should be let out. But this sentence is not over," she told NDTV in an exclusive interview. "It (the top court's decision) is shocking. It is hurtful. And it is not fair. It is biased and that's what hurts," she said.
The top court -- which gave orders for the release of Yadav on July 29 -- issued the detailed order today, in which it directed that convicts who have completed their sentences should be released immediately without any review or special order.
The exception would be the life sentence convicts who have to spend the rest of their lives in prison, the court said. They would need a remission order from the Sentence Review Board.
It is the duration of Sukhdev Yadav's sentence which has proved the point of contention in his release.
Sukhdev Yadav was given a fixed-term life sentence of 20 years, which ended on March 9.
When he was not released -- the Sentence Review Board refusing remission citing his conduct -- he challenged it in the Supreme Court. He was initially given a furlough and then the top court ordered that he be released.
Neelam Katara, however, told NDTV that it was "not term sentence".
The sentence "simply said life imprisonment with no remission for 20 years -- which is what was carried out. After 20 years, he was eligible for remission if the sentence review board of the government thought so," she said.
The matter was sent to the Sentence Review Board, which decided that "he was not ready to rejoin society because of various things which he may have done during his jail term," she added.
Explaining how she knew that the sentence was interpreted incorrectly, she said the convicts in her son's murder were given death by the lower court. But it was later commuted to a life sentence.
"When I asked for enhancements in the High Court, the court said they couldn't agree to my plea... but they were enhancing it from a simple sitter life sentence to life sentence with no remission -- for actually 20 years in the case of Pehelwan," she said.
A 'life term' means a convict having to spend the rest of his natural life in jail.
23-year-old Nitish Katara was kidnapped and murdered in 2002 for his love affair with Bharti Yadav, the daughter of former Rajya Sabha MP DP Yadav.
Besides Sukhdev, the men responsible were her brother Vikas Yadav and his cousin Vishal.
In October 2016 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court had sentenced Sukhdev to a 20-year life term. Vikas and Vishal Yadav were sentenced to 25 years in prison without furlough.
