Colombo, July 10 (ANI): The parents of a prisoner who died in obscure circumstances in Sri Lanka, are being denied the right to take their son's body to his home town for last rites.

Ganesan Nimalaruban died and several other inmates, all Tamil Tiger suspects, were reportedly injured after a failed prison mutiny in the north.

Sri Lankan authorities have denied mistreating him, saying that Nimalaruban died of a heart attack.

Human rights lawyers working with Nimalaruban's parents have lodged a petition over the death at the Supreme Court, The BBC reports.

Nimalaruban's parents seek to overturn a court ruling that he must be cremated near Colombo, and not in their home district, Vavuniya in northern Sri Lanka.

According to the report, they reject assertions by the authorities that such a funeral would be a security risk.

Earlier, in Vavuniya Prison, 32 inmates who are Tamil Tiger suspects took three prison guards hostage in late June, holding them for 19 hours in a protest against prisoner transfers.

The siege was successfully broken and all the prisoners relocated.

The rights campaigners and Tamil MP claimed that the prison authorities and police worked with other inmates to exact a terrible revenge, attacking them with stones and weapons, physically throwing them or breaking their legs. (ANI)