India extending help to Kerala nurse facing death sentence in Yemen
Ms. Priya reportedly reached Yemen in 2011 to work as a nurse in Sana'a while her husband and minor daughter later returned to India in 2014 because of financial reasons
New Delhi: India on Tuesday said it is extending all possible help to explore relevant options in the case of an Indian nurse from Kerala Nimisha Priya facing a death sentence in Yemen. Ms Priya has been serving a prison sentence since 2017 for the murder of a Yemeni national.
Soon after west Asian nation Yemen’s President Rashad al-Alimi approved the death sentence for the Indian nurse hailing from Kollengode in Kerala's Palakkad district, India said the family of the nurse is “exploring relevant options” and that the Indian government is “extending all possible help in the matter”.
Ministry of external affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal also said the government is “aware of the sentencing of Ms Priya”. Yemen’s Supreme Court too had upheld the death penalty for the 36-year-old nurse.
According to reports, Ms Priya can be executed in a month's time. Her mother Prema Kumari, 57, had reached Yemen’s capital Sana'a earlier in 2024 to secure a waiver of the death penalty and negotiate the blood money with the victim's family. The concept of blood money (financial compensation) to the family of the deceased is part of traditional law in Yemen.
Ms Priya was found guilty of killing Talal Abdo Mahdi, a Yemeni national, in 2017 and was subsequently sentenced to death by a trial court in Yemen in 2018. Since then, according to reports, her family has been fighting for her release and had petitioned Yemen’s Supreme Court against the trial court's order, but their appeal was rejected.
According to the latest reports, now that the country's President has also rejected Ms Priya's appeal, her release now depends on securing forgiveness from the family of the deceased and their tribal leaders and payment of blood money to the family.
The talks with the family of the deceased, as per reports, had come to an abrupt halt in September 2024 after a lawyer Abdullah Ameer demanded a pre-negotiation fee of $20,000 (approximately Rs16.6 lakh) and also reportedly insisted on a total fee of US $40,000, payable in two installments before he would resume talks. According to reports, the Save Nimisha Priya International Action Council that was formed succeeded in raising the first installment of Mr Ameer's fee through crowdfunding but later faced difficulties in ensuring transparency to donors about how the funds were being used.
Ms. Priya reportedly reached Yemen in 2011 to work as a nurse in Sana'a while her husband and minor daughter later returned to India in 2014 because of financial reasons. The same year, Yemen was gripped by civil war, and they could not go back, as the country stopped issuing new visas, according to reports. Later in 2015, Ms Priya sought Mahdi's support to set up her clinic in Sana'a, as under Yemen's law, only nationals are allowed to set up clinics and business firms.
Reports citing her appeal plea in the Yemeni Supreme Court said that in 2015, Mahdi accompanied Ms Priya to Kerala when she came for a month-long holiday. During the visit, he stole her wedding photograph, which he later manipulated to claim that he was married to her and also apparently grabbed her passport. A jail warden reportedly then suggested to Ms. Priya in the west Asian nation that she should try to sedate him to retrieve her passport from his clutches. However, sedation did not affect Mahdi, who was a substance abuser, reports said, adding that she tried sedating him again, using a stronger sedative to retrieve her passport, but he died within a few minutes due to a drug overdose. In the aftermath, Ms Priya and her colleague, Yemeni national Hanan, were accused of dismembering Mahdi’s body and disposing it off in a water tank.