Nimisha Priya execution in Yemen: Nothing much we can do, Centre to SC

New Delhi: The Government of India is doing whatever is “utmost possible” in the matter pertaining to an Indian nurse, Nimisha Priya, who is facing execution for murder in Yemen on July 16, the Centre on Monday told the Supreme Court.

Attorney General R Venkataramani told a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta that, having regard to the sensitivity and status of Yemen as a place, there is nothing much the Government of India can do.

“There is a point up to which the Government of India can go and we have reached that point,” the top law officer said.

AICC general secretary K C Venugopal on Saturday claimed that the central government was not taking any steps to intervene with the execution of Nimisha Priya, a nurse from the state convicted of murder in Yemen.

Venugopal contended that it was “sad” that the Centre was not showing any urgency in the matter despite the issue being brought to the attention of the Prime Minister and the External Affairs Ministry.

The AICC general secretary, who is also the MP from Alappuzha Lok Sabha constituency, said in a post on social media platform ‘X’ that the death sentence imposed on Priya was a “grave travesty of justice”.

Nimisha Priya, who hails from Kollengode in Palakkad district, was convicted in 2020 for the murder of a Yemeni man who had been her business partner.

The incident took place in July 2017. Her appeal was rejected by Yemen’s Supreme Judicial Council in November last year, and the country’s public prosecutor has now ordered that her sentence be carried out on Tuesday, July 16. She is currently being held in Sana’a Central Prison.