Times of India
COIMBATORE, Apr 16: To the world, it was a stunning revelation to learn that Priyanka Vadra had met Nalini, serving a life term for involvement in Rajiv Gandhi's assassination.
For Priyanka, it was an attempt to attain closure, to come to terms with the tragic loss of her beloved father. But how did Nalini feel about the meeting?
According to the account she gave to her brother, it was a singularly emotional encounter. "I feel all my sins have been washed off by Priyanka's visit...I feel she has pardoned me by calling on me at the prison.... I am indebted to her all my life," she told her younger brother P S Bhagyanathan a few days after her March 19 meeting with Priyanka behind the majestic walls of Vellore prison.
Bhagyanathan - who was also an accused in the case but was declared innocent - said Nalini told him she was "awed and amazed" by the "generosity" shown by Priyanka.
"I feel very happy to have met her. I always had huge respect for Rajiv Gandhi's family, but now the respect has really increased," Nalini told Bhagyanathan.
Not surprisingly, her "spirits were very low" and she was feeling "very depressed". But ever since the meeting, "Nalini has been very cheerful," revealed Bhagyanathan.
"In this world of tit for tat and blood for blood, we are really happy that Priyanka came to meet my sister. Our family has huge respect for Sonia Gandhi," he said.
Nalini, the only surviving member of the killer squad, had been sentenced to death. But after Sonia Gandhi pleaded for clemency for the sake of Nalini's then five-year-old daughter, her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
She can never be freed from prison unless the life term is commuted.
"We do not know when she will be released. But we know she is innocent. The only sin she committed was to have gone to the assassination site," insisted Bhagyanathan. His elder sister "accidentally" became part of the group which killed Rajiv Gandhi, he said.
Nalini, who passed out of Ethiraj College with a first class degree in economics, completed her post graduation by correspondence. While working as a stenographer in a private company, she came into contact with Murugan, her husband and co-accused in the case.
The rest is tragic history.
"Don't ask me anything about the past. All I can tell you is she was a very good student and obtained first class throughout her education," said Bhagyanathan, who works as a psychological counsellor.
After his release from prison, Bhagyanathan pursued a masters in psychology and obtained an MS in psychotherapy from the Indian Psychological Medical Society in Mumbai.
With his past haunting him, no one would give him a job.
For a while, he assisted a cable TV operator in Chennai. Now, he is a busy psychologist, offering home counseling to children and drug addicts.
"Our family wants to be useful to society. So, I treat poor and lower middle class patients free of cost. I successfully counseled an engineer who was a drug addict for 33 years." But till now, none of his clients knew Nalini is his sister.
He now lives in Chennai with his mother Padma, his wife and one-year-old daughter. "Our family is very affectionate. My mother, Nalini, me and younger sister, all of us yearned for love," he said.