The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed the curative petitions of two of the four rapists in the Nirbhaya case who have been sentenced to death. This is their last possible legal appeal against the death sentence. A mercy petition before the President is now the only option.
A Delhi court had on January 7 issued the death warrant against the four death row convicts in the Nirbhaya gang rape case of 2012. The brutal rape and murder had shocked and outraged people across the nation. The time of hanging had been fixed at 7 am on January 22 at Tihar Jail. The four convicts on death row are Pawan Gupta, Mukesh Singh, Akshay Singh and Vinay Sharma.
On Tuesday, a five-judge bench headed by Justice NV Ramana dismissed the petition of Vinay Sharma and Mukesh Singh after an in-chamber hearing. Sharma had appealed for an open hearing as he alleged that there had been a “systemic and political bias” against him. In his petition, he said that the execution would destroy his entire family as his father has only a small earning and they have no savings.
Six persons were arrested and charged with rape and murder of the 23-year-old medical student in Delhi in 2012. One of the accused was a minor and was tried in the juvenile justice court. Another accused – Ram Singh – had committed suicide in Tihar Jail.
The remaining four were sentenced to death by a trial court in September 2013, and the verdict was confirmed by Delhi High Court in 2014 and upheld by Supreme Court in 2017. Their review policies were dismissed too.
In a recent book Black Warrant (written by Sunil Gupta & Sunetra Choudhury, published by Roli Books), Gupta, the former spokesperson & legal advisor of Tihar jail, recalled his interactions with Ram Singh and what he himself witnessed when the alarm went off at Tihar on the day of the alleged suicide.
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