Urgent efforts are underway to prevent the execution of Kerala nurse Nimisha Priya, scheduled for tomorrow in Yemen, for the murder of a Yemeni national.
According to reports, the prospect of her death sentence has prompted intervention from a powerful religious figure: Kanthapuram AP Aboobacker Musliyar, the Grand Mufti of India and a prominent Sunni Muslim leader. He has personally stepped in to engage with the family of the victim, Talal Abdo Mahdi, urging them to accept ‘blood money’ in exchange for forgiveness.
Kanthapuram, aged 94 and officially known as Sheikh Abubakr Ahmad, has already held discussions with religious authorities in Yemen. Following these talks, a critical meeting is scheduled today in Dhamar, led by the renowned scholar and Sufi leader Sheikh Habib Umar bin Hafiz, at Kanthapuram’s request. Representatives of Umar bin Hafiz will participate in this dialogue with Mahdi’s family, aiming to secure a breakthrough.
Significantly, a close relative of the victim — who also serves as the Chief Justice of the Hodeidah State Court and is a member of Yemen’s Shura Council — has arrived in Dhamar to take part in these discussions. This relative’s involvement came on the advice of Umar bin Hafiz. “The fact that he is a follower of Sheikh Habib Umar’s Sufi order and the son of another prominent Sufi leader offers great hope,” Kanthapuram’s office said in a statement quoted by the media. It added that besides persuading the family, this relative is expected to meet the Attorney General to initiate urgent efforts to postpone the execution scheduled for tomorrow.
The statement further emphasised that the family’s willingness to engage with representatives of Umar bin Hafiz is viewed as a “positive signal towards our efforts to halt the scheduled execution for the time being.”
The murder of Mahdi has deeply affected not only his family but also the tribes and residents of the Dhamar region, making initial contact with the family extremely difficult. Kanthapuram’s office explained that “it was only through Kanthapuram’s intervention that communication with the family became possible for the first time.”
On the legal front, the government informed the Supreme Court on Monday that there was “nothing much” they could do to secure Nimisha Priya’s release or halt her execution. Attorney General R Venkataramani told a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta that the government was attempting its best “at a private level” by contacting some sheikhs and other influential figures in Yemen.
Nimisha Priya, a nurse from Kerala’s Palakkad district, was sentenced to death by a local Yemeni court in 2020. Her family’s appeal against the decision in Yemen’s Supreme Court was dismissed in 2023. Moreover, in January this year, Mahdi al-Mashat, President of the rebel Houthis’ Supreme Political Council, formally approved her execution.
She is currently held in a jail in Sanaa, Yemen’s capital.
According to Yemen’s Sharia law, Nimisha Priya’s only chance for reprieve lies in the acceptance of ‘blood money’ or ‘diyah’ by the victim’s family. Her negotiation team has offered financial assistance amounting to USD 1 million to secure this mercy.
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