SC expunges its objectionable remarks on Staines

NEW DELHI: In a rare move, the Supreme Court has replaced its controversial observations made while delivering the judgement in the Graham Staines murder case.

A bench comprising Justice P Sathasivam and Justice BS Chauhan, which had given the verdict last Friday, replaced the original remarks in two different paragraphs with new sentences: "However, more than 12 years have elapsed since the act was committed, we are of the opinion that the life sentence awarded by the High Court need not be enhanced in view of the factual position discussed in the earlier paragraphs." said the bench in its one of such replacement.

The original para in the judgement had read: "In the case on hand, though Graham Staines and his two minor sons were burnt to death while they were sleeping inside a station wagon at Manoharpur, the intention was to teach a lesson to Graham Staines about his religious activities, namely, converting poor tribals to Christianity."

The bench also replaced its earlier observations with new para which said: "There is no justification for interfering in someone's religious belief by any means."

In its original observations the bench had said: "It is undisputed that there is no justification for interfering in someone's belief by way of use of force, provocation, conversion, incitement or upon a flawed premise that one religion is better than the other."

The court's rare move of expunging its own remarks, which it called a clarification, came in the wake of criticism by a section of the media and Christian organisations against reference to conversion.

Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two minor sons were burnt to death in their stationwagon in Orissa's Keonjhar district in January 22 1999 by a murderous mob led by Dara Singh.

Dara Singh and his accomplice Mahendra Hembram, convicted in the case escaped death penalty with the Supreme Court ruling that the crime was not "rarest of rare". It had upheld the life sentence awarded to them by the Orissa High Court.