Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan -- sentenced to death in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case -- wait in narrow cells between the gallows and a clemency petition. The fourth, Nalini, is in another block in the same jail.

The three male prisoners occupy a block along with three others awarded life sentences in the same case -- Ravichandran, Robert Paes and Jayakumar. The block is surrounded by 18-feet-high walls, with barbed wire fencing on one side.

The cells are opened every morning at 6 am and till 8 am they have access to the open space outside their cells. A game of badminton and some walking later, they are back to their block. They then spend their time watching Doordarshan programmes on the television set kept in the corridor outside the cells. In the evenings, it is another hour of play before they are back in their cells by 6 pm.

If their plea formercy is rejected by the President, they will remain locked up in the cells all day and be treated as `A' class prisoners till the day of execution.

Once every fortnight they meet their relatives. Murugan gets to meet his wife Nalini on alternate Saturdays. Advocates come calling more often. Nalini's mother, brother, sister and brother-in-law visit Murugan, and Perarivalan's parents and sister, based in Jolarpet, come regularly on `visitors day'. Santhan, a Lankan, seldom has visitors.

While the officials claim that the gallows with a capacity to hang two persons at a time, have always been in a state of readiness, they have been getting ready for the order. The keels have been oiled and the lever that propels the wooden door, checked. Manila ropes used to hang convicts are ready, say the authorities.

The last time that the gallows were used in the Vellore prison was in 1983 when Chandru, who was condemned to death for murdering a child, was hanged. There have been hangings after that, notorious killerAuto Shankar was hanged in 1995 in the Salem jail. There is no hangman at Vellore, but the prison officials themselves have been doing it.

Jail officials feel that the hanging, if at all, will not take place soon. Two more people condemned to death are awaiting the fate of their clemency petition in the jail. Gopi and Mohan -- sentenced for kidnapping and murdering a girl -- had filed a clemency petition in July 1998. In the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, the mercy petition has only been forwarded to the Tamil Nadu Governor and after her opinion, it will be sent to the President.

According to S Dorairaj, counsel for the prisoners, November 5, the date fixed by the TADA court for the execution, is `zero time', the earliest that the prisoners can be hanged. However, with the filing of the mercy petition, the order has been stayed.

Nalini, the lone woman, clad in the jail uniform of maroon-coloured saree and white blouse, spends her time doing yoga, playing chess and carrom and reading. The post-graduatein Economics reads fiction, propaganda literature and religious texts.

Her fortnightly discussions with her husband centers on the case and the future of their seven-year-old daughter Arithra, who is now under the care of Murugan's mother in Sri Lanka. She wants Arithra to study medicine and they are now deciding whether to continue her education in Sri Lanka, India, Switzerland or London, where Murugan's brothers live.

The last she saw her daughter was six months ago before she was taken to Sri Lanka. Murugan, who sources say was very reluctant to sign the clemency petition, has now sought a meeting with his daughter.

Sources in the jail say that Muruagan had reconciled to the reality long before the Supreme Court rejected their appeal. When the news was conveyed to him, Murugan is supposed to have said: ``Idhallam therunjadhudhane (``don't we know this already'').