Vellore, Apr 16: Nalini Murugan, serving a life sentence in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, considers her last month's meeting with Priyanka Vadra at Vellore prison a defining moment of her life, as she felt she had been "cleansed of her sins, though committed unknowingly", her brother PS Bhagyanathan said.

Nalini's spirits were "high" ever since her meeting with Priyanka on March 19, Bhagyanathan, who was also an accused in the case but later acquitted, said.

"When I met her after their meeting, she told me she felt she had been cleansed of her sins, though committed unknowingly," Bhagyanathan, a counsellor, quoted his sister as saying without making a direct reference to the 1991 assassination of the former Prime Minister.

He, however, said that media glare on the "very personal meeting" and speculations arising out of it pained him and his elder sister. "She was indeed elated after the meeting", but the media speculation could curtail her happiness over the meeting as "she is not the kind who wants such media publicity", he told here.

However, "she did not reveal much of what transpired between the two", he added.

S Duraisamy, Nalini's counsel, had said yesterday that the latter had been in constant touch with Congress President Sonia Gandhi ever since she helped in getting her clemency.

Nalini was sentenced to death along with her husband Murugan and two others, stated to be activists of LTTE.

It was later commuted to life imprisonment after Sonia Gandhi intervened.

Nalini had also sent a telegram to her, wishing speedy recovery, when the latter was hospitalised recently.

Duraisamy had also said that a petition seeking release of Nalini was pending before Madras High Court.