Petition Obstacle In Nirbhaya Rapists’ Execution On March 3

New Delhi: A Delhi court has issued a notice to the Tihar Central Jail authorities, seeking a response on the petition filed by convicts Akshay Singh and Pawan Kumar Gupta that sought a stay on the execution of their death warrants, scheduled for March 3, in the Nirbhaya gang rape-murder case.

The two convicts had moved the court on the ground that a fresh mercy and curative petition filed by two of them is pending.

The court has posted the next hearing for 10 am on March 2.

The four convicts — Akshay, Pawan, Vinay Kumar Sharma and Akshay Kumar — are scheduled to be hanged at 6 AM on March 3.

During the hearing, advocate AP Singh, appearing for Akshay, informed the court that he had filed a fresh mercy petition as the facts in the previous one were not complete. Pawan, in his plea, contended that his curative petition has been pending in the Supreme Court. He is yet to avail the remedy of filing a mercy plea.

Pawan had pleaded that his age on the day of offence was 16 years and two months as per the school records last attended by him and this information was suppressed by the state throughout the proceedings.

President Ram Nath Kovind has already rejected mercy petitions of Mukesh Kumar Singh, Vinay Kumar Sharma and Akshay.

The case pertains to the gangrape of a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern, in a moving bus in South Delhi on December 16, 2012. She died a fortnight later.