Supreme Court Refuses To Entertain Plea Against Public Comments On Nimisha Priya Case

The Supreme Court today dismissed as withdrawn a petition filed by evangelist Dr KA Paul seeking to restrain public comments and media reporting in relation to the case of Keralite nurse Nimisha Priya, who is on death row in Yemen for the murder of Yemeni national Talal Abdo Mahdi.

A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta heard the matter. During the hearing, Attorney General R Venkataramani informed that the Union holds periodic press briefings on the case and assured that it would take care of the media reporting issue until final resolution of Priya's impending sentence. 

During the hearing, the Save Nimisha Priya International Action Council (comprising former judges, MPs, MLA, etc. who have come together to save Priya) also orally conveyed to the Court that they would refrain from addressing the media.

In this backdrop, Paul's petition was dismissed as withdrawn.

Notably, Paul informed the Court that he is working with the government to secure Priya's release and is holding talks with the victim's family. He further said that the victim's family is willing to pardon Priya, subject to 3 conditions, two of which he has already fulfilled. According to his claims, the victim's family was displeased by media reports that blood money has been collected and paid to them. Paul also clarified that he was not seeking a gag order against the government briefings.

He was countered by Save Nimisha Priya International Action Council's counsel-Senior Advocate Ragenth Basant, who stated that the first step is for the victim's family to pardon Priya. Thereafter, the question of blood money would come in.

Hearing the parties, the bench opined that it does not have jurisdiction over Yemen and questioned as to why it shall entertain the petition. As it was not inclined to pass a media gag order in view of the Union's assurance, the case was ultimately dismissed as withdrawn.

Background

Nimisha Priya, a 36-year-old nurse from Kerala, is facing the death penalty in Yemen for the 2017 murder of Yemeni national Talal Abdo Mahdi. She allegedly tried to sedate Talal with ketamine to recover her passport, which he is stated to have seized after forging documents to claim that she was his wife. The sedative overdose led to his death.

She was sentenced to death in 2018, retried in 2020 with the same outcome, and lost her appeal before Yemen's Supreme Judicial Council in 2023. The Yemeni President later approved the death sentence.

Under Shariat law, a death sentence can be set aside if the victim's family pardons the convict in exchange for “blood money.” The organization Save Nimisha Priya International Action Council, formed by her relatives and supporters, has been trying to secure such a pardon.

On July 18, the Supreme Court allowed the Save Nimisha Priya International Action Council to make a representation to the Government for permission for a small team, including a representative of Kerala Sunni Islamic leader Kanthapuram AP Aboobacker Musaliyar, to travel to Yemen to meet Talal's family. The organization claimed the cleric's earlier intervention had helped secure a postponement of Priya's execution, which was originally scheduled for July 16.

A day before Priya's scheduled execution, reports came in that the execution had been postponed with the help of private interventions. The reprieve however was short-lived, as the family of the victim-Talal Abdo Mahdi, whom Priya is accused of killing, came out with a statement that they will not grant pardon to Priya.

Case Title: Dr. K. A. Paul @ Kilari Anand Paul v. Union of India, W.P.(C) No. 803/2025

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