Odisha Board Turns Down Dara Singh's Premature Release Plea Again

The Odisha government has turned down a fresh plea for premature release from Rabindra Kumar Pal, better known as Dara Singh, who is serving a life sentence for the 1999 burning deaths of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons.

The State Sentence Review Board, which met on August 31, said it was not inclined to recommend his release at this stage. The panel noted that a report from the Keonjhar district authorities was inconclusive and lacked a specific recommendation.

The district administration had, in March 2025, suggested that Singh could be freed under certain conditions to preserve social harmony. However, a subsequent report on August 28 flagged that around 200 to 250 people linked to the Dara Sena had gathered outside the Keonjhar District Jail on August 15 in connection with the proposed release, with provocative slogans reportedly raised.

The Supreme Court had on August 19 directed the Board to decide on the plea. On September 8, a bench of Justices Manoj Misra and Vijay Bishnoi questioned the delay, saying the matter could not be kept lingering, and posted it for hearing on September 17.

Singh, a native of Auraiya district in Uttar Pradesh, was 37 when he was arrested and has been lodged in Keonjhar jail since January 2000. He was sentenced to death by a CBI court in September 2003, but the Orissa High Court commuted the punishment to life imprisonment in June 2005, a decision upheld by the Supreme Court in 2011.

This is not the first time his plea has been rejected. The Board had earlier turned it down in November 2016, June 2019, December 2020, January 2022 and February 2023, citing reasons that included the apprehension of communal disturbance in the area. After those repeated rejections, Singh approached the Supreme Court in July 2024 seeking premature release.