Manu Sharma a free man 21 years after Lal murder
NEW DELHI: Manu Sharma, who was serving a life term after being convicted of the murder of model Jessica Lal in 1999, was released from Tihar jail on Monday evening. His release, along with that of 18 other convicts, was approved by lieutenant governor (LG) Anil Baijal.
Confirming the release, Sharma’s lawyer Amit Sahni said the lieutenant governor had accepted the recommendations of the sentence review board. A spokesperson from the L-G’S office said the sentence review board recommended Sharma’s release without any disagreement, and that the L-G concurred with the recommendations approved by state home minister Satyendar Jain.
Any convict -- barring one found guilty of heinous crimes such as rape and murder, murder and robbery, murder in cases of terrorism and murder while out on parole -- who has completed 14 years in prison is eligible for early release. Sharma has served around 16 years of sentencing. According to jail records, with time earned for good conduct (remission), he has completed 23 years. Prison director-general Sandeep Goel confirmed that Sharma was released on Monday. Since 2018, he was lodged in the open jail of the prison. Open jail prisoners are allowed to step out but have to spend the night inside the complex. HT first reported this development on April 22, 2018, and that it was possibly the penultimate step towards his release. In November 2019, Sharma’s advocate, approached the Delhi high court seeking his release. The Delhi high court then asked the board to consider Sharma’s case for release.
Siddharth Vashishta,43, better known by his alias Manu Sharma, shot dead model Jessica Lal, who was tending an unlicensed bar at a private party on April 30, 1999, after she refused to serve him a drink well past midnight.
He is the son of Haryana politician Venod Sharma. Lal’s sister Sabrina said on Tuesday, “The past is behind me. Our fight was always for justice.”