The Delhi government has recommended rejecting mercy petition of Pawan Gupta, one of the four death row convicts in the 2012 Delhi gang rape and murder case.
The Delhi government yesterday had recommended rejecting the plea soon after it received it from the Union Home Ministry.
The Union Home Ministry has already received Pawan’s mercy plea. The ministry will forward it to President Ram Nath Kovind for his consideration and decision.
Going by the rejection of three other mercy petitions of the convicts, it is expected that Pawan’s plea also will be rejected by Kovind.
The three convicts whose pleas were rejected by the President are: Mukesh, Vinay and Akshay.
A Delhi court yesterday had deferred till further order the hanging of the convicts.
Hanging of the four convicts was scheduled for Tuesday at 6 am.
A trial court on February 17 had issued fresh date for execution of death warrants for March 3 at 6 am for the four convicts – Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Pawan, Vinay Kumar Sharma (26) and Akshay Singh (31) – in the case.
Pawan had sought commutation of death sentence to life imprisonment.
In his petition, he had pleaded that his age on the day of offence in 2012 was 16 years and two months.
Pawan, alleged that his age was not determined by the police, before booking him under the rape case as the procedures laid down under the Juvenile Justice Act.
He also alleged the state suppressed the information throughout the proceedings.
The court said there is no scope left for the convict to re-examine his conviction and punishment.
Pawan is the last death row convict in the case to move the top court with his curative plea, the final legal remedy available to a person.
Meanwhile, the Patiala House Court deferred the hanging of the convicts. Earlier in the day, the court had dismissed the plea seeking a stay on the execution sought by the convicts Akshay Singh and Pawan Kumar Gupta.
Nirbhaya Case
Nirbhaya, aged 23, was gangraped and brutally assaulted in a moving bus in South Delhi on December 16, 2012.
Nirbhaya, a physiotherapy intern, breathed her last a fortnight later.
Six people, including the four convicts and a juvenile, were named as accused.
Ram Singh, the sixth accused, allegedly committed suicide in Tihar jail days after the trial began in the case. The juvenile was released in 2015 after spending three years in a correctional home.