As Nimisha Priya’s fate hangs in balance, wheels in motion ‘at various levels’ to secure a lifeline

Nimisha Priya’s mother, Prema Kumari, who has been camping in Yemen since last year, told The Indian Express, “I met my daughter in jail last month. She is suffering in silence.”

Back in Kerala, prominent Muslim leader and general secretary of the All India Sunni Jamiyyathul Ulama, Kanthapuram A P Aboobacker Musliyar, has also made interventions to try and secure Nimisha’s release. Musaliyar has urged a prominent Sufi scholar in Yemen to hold discussions with Talal’s family and local leadership to see that the family pardons the woman.

Nimisha, who hailed from Palakkad, had worked as a nurse in Yemen for several years until she was accused of murder in 2017. With Talal’s support, Nimish ran a clinic in Yemen, but she allegedly faced mental, physical and financial abuse, which culminated in the killing.

The death sentence was awarded to her by a trial court in Yemen and upheld by the country’s Supreme Court. Last year, Yemen’s President Rashad al-Alimi approved the death sentence for the 38-year-old woman. The order has been with the prosecutor since January this year.

Since then, her fate has been hanging by a thread, depending on a pardon from Talal’s family.

On Monday, the Centre informed the Supreme Court that it had done all it could to save Nimisha. “There’s nothing much the government can do… looking at the sensitivity of Yemen… it’s not diplomatically recognised… There’s a point till which the government of India can go. We have reached that. Yemen is not like any other part of the world. We didn’t want to complicate the situation by going public, we are trying at a private level,” Attorney-General R Venkataramani, appearing for the Centre, said.