Nirbhaya Case: Notice to Convicts on Fresh Death Warrant

NEW DELHI:
A court here on Wednesday issued notice to four death-row convicts in the Nirbhaya case on an application moved by the Delhi government seeking issuance of fresh date for their execution.

The Delhi government moved the court seeking a fresh date for hanging of convicts a few hours after President Ram Nath Kovind rejected the plea for pardon moved by one of the death-row convicts, Pawan.

“In my opinion, principal of natural justice, which is implicit in Article 21 of Constitution of India and the scaroscant principal of Audi Alteram Partem (nobody can be condemned unheard) cannot be ignored by the court,” Additional Sessions Judge Dharmendra Rana stated.

The court has sought convict”s response and posted the matter to 2 p.m. on Thursday. The four convicts — Mukesh Singh, Pawan Gupta, Vinay Kumar Sharma and Akshay Kumar — were scheduled to be executed on March 3 at 6 a.m. but the court deferred it till further orders on the grounds that Pawan”s mercy petition is pending.

The case pertains to the gang-rape and murder of a 23-year-old girl, dubbed later as Nirbhaya, in the national capital in December 2012. 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.