M Ravi, the man who defied Singapore regime's harassment, dies

M Ravi never gave up despite the odds stacked against him by the Singapore regime, which has always used its grip on the legal process to silence critics.

M Ravi, one of Singapore's best-known personalities who was at the forefront of legal cases challenging the PAP regime over human rights violations, has died. He was 56.

The news has come as a shock to friends and activists. Singapore's The Straits Times reported that police were investigating the "unnatural death".

Ravi made a name for himself representing prisoners on death row amid the Singapore government's insistence on maintaining the death penalty, despite a series of controversial convictions over the years that saw drug mules from Malaysia executed, many of whom he represented pro bono.

Ravi had a difficult childhood growing up in a poor family and witnessing his mother's struggles, a story he told in Kampong Boy, an autobiography he published in 2013.

In his social media posts, he often paid tribute to his late mother, who worked hard to ensure he received an education.

Ravi graduated in political science from the National University of Singapore before later taking a loan to study law at the University of Cardiff. Back in Singapore, he worked for a while as a Tamil-language newscaster and was called to the Bar in 1997.

A turning point in his advocacy against the death penalty came when he took the case of Vignes Mourti, a young Malaysian Indian facing the death penalty after being charged with trafficking heroin into Singapore.

It was not an easy case, as his client was only two weeks away from execution.

Vignes was eventually executed.

"I felt it was terrible, like they’d rushed through the process. And that affected me, plus there was no outrage in the legal sector, in the legal community... it was disgraceful," Ravi told RICE, a portal on South East Asian politics and culture, in 2019.

Ravi went on to launch the Singapore Anti-Death Penalty Campaign.

The PAP-led Singapore regime has constantly harassed activists who question its decades-old grip on life in the city-state.

In recent years, Ravi has been a frequent target.

RELATED | Singapore: Remembering M Ravi

In 2023, his law practice licence was suspended over remarks he made in an interview on the case of a drug runner named Gobi Avedian.

A court in Singapore accused him of making "grave and baseless accusations of improper conduct" against the attorney-general as well as officers from the AG's Chambers and the Singapore Law Society.

Ravi refused to be intimidated and instead doubled down on his views when asked to retract his remarks, saying he was entitled to criticise "the unfairness associated to the miscarriage of justice".

Referring to Gobi's case, he said he was glad that he had managed to reopen a death penalty case and save "at least one life".

"I have choices. I chose to dedicate my 20 years to the cause of human rights and access to justice in Singapore at huge personal cost. I have no regrets," said Ravi.

It was not the only time Ravi was stopped from continuing his work as a human rights lawyer in Singapore, where the legal fraternity would normally maintain a safe distance for fear of repercussions.

Ravi represented, among others, Malaysian Nagaenthran K Dharmalingam, who was controversially executed in Singapore for a drug offence.

Nagaenthran, who had been diagnosed with a low IQ that made him unfit for capital punishment, was hanged on April 27, 2023.

Ravi had urged the Malaysian government to take Nagaenthran's case to the International Court of Justice, saying his former client had not even been given an opportunity to be assessed by his psychiatrists.

“Without giving an opportunity to have him properly assessed, and to take away his life, is a waste of this entire judicial exercise,” he had told MalaysiaNow.

Ravi and fellow lawyer Violet Netto were fined S$20,000 after they were accused of not following the standards expected of a lawyer in filing last-minute applications in court to save Nagaenthran’s life.

A defiant Ravi then told the court: "History will be with me and will judge me."

Source: malaysianow.com, Staff, December 24, 2025

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde

Comments

Tennessee | Republicans legislature to investigate other execution methods after failed lethal injections

Republican leaders in Tennessee’s legislature say they will investigate the reliability of lethal injection as an execution method after the state failed to execute two death row inmates in the span of five months. Gov. Bill Lee stopped the May execution of Tony Carruthers after a physician unsuccessfully attempted to insert intravenous lines to begin the lethal injection process for over an hour. Death row inmate Christa Pike survived two failed rounds of Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol on Sept. 30 before the execution was halted. Pike, who was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer, is receiving medical care in a Nashville hospital.

Florida Set to Execute Man Who Said He Killed to Reach Death Row, Challenging Misconception that Death Penalty Deters Crime

Florida is scheduled to execute James Robertson at noon on Tuesday, October 13, at Florida State Prison. His execution remains scheduled despite the withdrawal of William Lee Thompson’s death warrant, which had called for a 2nd execution that evening. If completed, this will be Florida’s 17th execution of 2026. Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) and partners will be holding a series of vigils and demonstrations across the state.

What Tennessee wants to do next to Christa Pike is beyond grim

Christa Pike, the woman who survived two execution attempts in Tennessee earlier this week, remains hospitalized in critical condition, where presumably medical staff is at work trying to keep her alive. If she wakes from the coma she had entered, Tennessee officials want to start anew to inject lethal drugs into her seemingly too-small veins to kill her and carry out the state death warrant. Pike also is being treated for “significant injuries to both arms” sustained when two lethal injections of pentobarbital failed to kill her. If she dies, there will be no need to try again. As we know by now, Tennessee tried to put Pike to death Wednesday night by lethal injection for a murder she committed when she was 18. She would have been the first woman executed in the state in 200 years.

Tennessee | Christa Pike’s lawyer says she has not regained consciousness since her failed execution

Christa Pike has remained unconscious and on a ventilator at a hospital in the four days since her failed execution in Tennessee, and her prognosis might not be known for days more, one of her lawyers said Sunday. Little has been released about Pike’s condition since Wednesday night’s execution attempt. She has since remained hospitalized under guard as doctors try to get the massive dose of the barbiturate pentobarbital out of her system. When asked whether she ever regained consciousness after the execution attempt, Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell, Pike’s lawyer, said on CNN’s “State of the Union”: “Not that I am aware of.”

Christa Pike's Survival Wasn't a Miracle. That's What Should Scare Us.

What happened in Tennessee's execution chamber is one of the most common failures in medicine Christa Pike is awake. A week after Tennessee strapped her to a gurney and gave her two doses of pentobarbital , she is off the ventilator and speaking from a hospital bed, still shackled to it. Her lawyers call her recovery " medically unprecedented. " Legal scholars say she is the first person in American history to survive a lethal injection after the drug was actually given. I understand the impulse to make such claims. I consulted for Pike's legal team, but I have also spent three decades in operating rooms and intensive care units (ICUs), and I want to resist the word "unprecedented" and the word "miracle" that hovers just behind it.

USA | Firing squad execution to be livestreamed, Pentagon says

The public will be able to watch the execution of a former US Army major by firing squad, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has said. A Defense Department official told the BBC the execution of Nidal Hasan, who shot dead 13 unarmed US soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009, would be livestreamed. It is believed it would be the first public execution in the US in almost a century. The decision to livestream it is "unprecedented in the modern era" and "on uncertain legal terrain", said John Mills, a lawyer who works with inmates sentenced to death.

Opinion | I Know Christa Pike’s Medical History. What Tennessee Did Is Unforgivable.

Dr. Zivot is an anesthesiologist and intensive care physician. He consulted on Christa Pike’s case before her attempted execution. On Wednesday night, Christa Pike lay strapped to a gurney at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville while the State of Tennessee injected pentobarbital, a sedative that is lethal in high doses, into her veins. When the 1st dose did not kill her, the execution team gave her a 2nd. At one point, she told the room her arm felt as if it were about to burst. She was nearly correct. More than an hour after the procedure began, an ambulance was called. She was severely injured but still alive.

Christa Pike: 4 Major Questions As She Returns to Death Row

As Christa Pike returns to death row after surviving Tennessee’s attempt to execute her, several questions remain about her case and what comes next. Pike, 50, was discharged from hospital and moved back to the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center, the women’s prison where she was housed for 30 years, her attorneys said on Saturday. She was hospitalized after surviving 2 doses of the lethal drug pentobarbital as Tennessee attempted to execute her on September 30. Pike was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, her classmate at a Job Corps training program in Knoxville, Tennessee. Pike was 18 at the time.

Singapore | Ministry of Home Affairs refutes claims that death penalty was discussed during visit by Israel's security ministry

The Ministry of Home Affairs says discussions with the Israeli government involved the sharing of best practices in emergency response, crime prevention, and forensics. Issues relating to the death penalty “were never part of the meeting and were not discussed." SINGAPORE: The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Friday (Sep 11) refuted claims by an Israeli media outlet that the death penalty was discussed during a visit by an Israeli delegation in May. The Haaretz newspaper reported on Sep 7 that a delegation comprising representatives from the Israel Prison Service and National Security Ministry made a “secret visit” to Singapore that month.

After Christa Pike survives lethal injection, America's shameful botched executions

The US is one of the few Western nations that still permits the death penalty, carried out regularly in 27 states. And in a country where regional political culture strongly favours retributive justice, it is no wonder capital punishment remains an enduring part of the American legal system. But following Christa Pike's botched lethal injection last week, fresh questions are being raised over whether executing convicted murderers and rapists outweighs the risks of an innocent person being put to death, or of an execution going so badly that a prisoner is left to die in agony, or even survives the attempt.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog