New Delhi, Jan 31, 2020: A Delhi court on January 31 postponed the execution of death warrants of the four Nirbhaya case convicts until further orders.

The four extracted another last-minute reprieve hours before they were to hang on February 1.

Nirbhaya’s mother Asha Devi wept as she said that a convict’s lawyer had “challenged” her in court.

The four were convicted for gang rape and murder of a young woman, identified only as Nirbhaya, in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, in the national capital.

“He challenged me…he said there would be no hanging,” the distraught mother told reporters after an excruciating day waiting in courts.

Convicts Pawan Gupta, Mukesh Singh, Akshay Singh and Vinay Sharma will not be hanged until further court orders.

Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana passed the order on plea by the convicts seeking a stay on their execution.

Their death sentence has already been put off once in a haze of review, curative and mercy petitions.

“The death warrant has been cancelled and no new date has been given,” said the lawyer of one of the convicts, AP Singh.

Taking advantage of a legal system that the government says is skewed, the convicts filed multiple petitions to stall their hanging.

A new petition was filed on January 31 before the Supreme Court and rejected. Pawan Gupta’s claim of being a minor at the time of the 2012 gang-rape and killing was dismissed by the Supreme Court for the second time in two weeks. He had asked the court to review its decision last week, even though he had been told that once rejected, an age claim cannot be contested repeatedly.

But it is the mercy petition filed by convict Vinay Sharma that secured today’s reprieve. Even if the President rejects it today, the convict has to be given 14 days till execution, under the rules.

Given the pattern, on the 13th day, another convict will file a mercy petition.

On the government’s request on January 22 for a change in the rules to prevent convicts from “playing with the law”, the Supreme Court today agreed to consider amendments that were more considerate towards the victims and their families. The government has suggested a time limit for the convicts to use their legal options so their death sentence is not delayed endlessly.

During the hearing, Tihar Jail authorities challenged the application to stay the hanging of three convicts — Pawan Kumar Gupta, Vinay Kumar Sharma and Akshay Kumar — saying that only one convict’s plea is pending and the others can be hanged.

Advocate A.P. Singh, representing the convicts, argued that rules dictate that when one convict’s plea is pending the others cannot be hanged.

The fourth person sentenced to death in the case is Mukesh Kumar, whose mercy plea was dismissed by President Ram Nath Kovind on January 17. The Supreme Court had on January 29 dismissed Mukesh’s plea against the President’s decision.

The court had on January 20 issued death warrants for February 1 against the four convicts in the case.

Source: ndtv.com, thehindu.com