HC rejects last-minute plea filed by 3 Nirbhaya convicts

Abhinav Garg & Aamir Khan@timesgroup.com

New Delhi:20.03.2020

By the time you read this report, the four Nirbhaya case convicts may have been hanged with Delhi high court dismissing a last-minute plea filed by three of them to stall the execution scheduled early on Friday.

“There has to be some sanctity and finality attached to a death warrant. It has already been postponed three times,” a bench of justices Manmohan and Sanjeev Narula observed, refusing to delay the punishment. The counsel for the convicts, A P Singh, said he would go to Supreme Court in the early hours to get a stay.

During the nearly twohour hearing that began at 10pm, the bench repeatedly underlined that not just the trial court, but even high court, Supreme Court and even the President had on several occasions rejected each petition filed by Mukesh, Akshay, Pawan and Vinay.

Nirbhaya’s parents and their legal team had rushed to high court after Chief Justice D N Patel allowed the listing of the case before a division bench on urgent mentioning of the same by Singh.

“We operate in a hierarchical system of courts. Your judgment has attained finality, we can’t sit over an SC verdict. Death warrants have to be executed,” the bench told advocate Singh who made a last-ditch effort to again defer the hangings.

“This matter actually shows how much delay is inbuilt into our system. When was the crime? Look where we are today. Appeals were dismissed in 2017. Why didn’t you file mercy plea for two and half years? There has been an attempt to play the system by way of staggered mercy petitions. Don’t blame courts,” the bench said.

Singh had sought a stay on the execution citing various petitions he had filed before several legal fora, including Supreme Court.

Full report on www.toi.in

THEIR VICTORY: Nirbhaya’s mother and father outside a Delhi c