Delhi court dismisses Nirbhaya convicts' pleas seeking stay of execution
A Delhi court on Monday (March 2) dismissed the pleas of two of the four death row convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case who were seeking a stay on the execution of death warrants, scheduled for Tuesday (March 3) morning.
A Delhi court on Monday (March 2) dismissed the pleas of two of the four convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case who had sought a stay on the execution of death warrants, scheduled for Tuesday (March 3) morning.
Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana rejected the applications of Akshay Singh and Pawan Kumar Gupta. After the order was passed, Gupta’s lawyer, AP Singh, told the court that a mercy plea has been filed by his client before the President and therefore, his execution ought to be stayed.
The court, thereafter, asked Singh to come after lunch to argue on the point.
The lawyer also said he filed the mercy plea after getting information that the Supreme Court had dismissed Gupta’s curative petition.
A five-judge bench headed by Justice NV Ramana said that no case is made out for re-examining the conviction and the punishment of the convict.
Related news: Nirbhaya case: SC rejects curative plea of convict Pawan Gupta
“They have wasted the court’s time and tried to subvert the system. Now they will be hanged tomorrow,” Hindustan Times quoted Nirbhaya’s mother as saying.
In his plea, Gupta had pleaded that his age on the day of offence in 2012 was 16 years and two months as per the school records last attended by him and that “the age has not been determined in accordance with the procedures laid down under the Juvenile Justice Act”.
The 25-year-old is the last of the four convicts to file a curative plea. Now, he has the option of filing a mercy plea. Two other out of the other three convicts, Mukesh Kumar Singh and Vinay Kumar Sharma, moved the top court after having their mercy pleas rejected only to find their pleas getting thrown out.
On February 29, they moved a Delhi court seeking a stay on the execution of the death warrants, which has been scheduled for March 3. One of the accused in the case, Ram Singh, committed suicide in jail. Another juvenile was released after spending three years in a reformation home.
On December 16, 2012, a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern, who came to be known as ‘Nirbhaya’ (fearless), was gang-raped and savagely assaulted in a moving bus in South Delhi. She died after a fortnight in a Singapore hospital.
(With inputs from agencies)
