In a post-midnight order on Monday, the Supreme Court stayed the execution of Nithari killer Surinder Koli hours before his scheduled hanging in Meerut jail. The order was passed around 1.40 am by the SC Bench headed by Justice Hl Dattu at his residence on an urgent petition moved by senior advocate Indira Jaising on Koli's behalf.
Koli is guilty of killing several children in a house in Nithari village of Noida in 2006. He was lodged at Meerut Jail and was scheduled to be hanged on Monday. With the scheduled date of his hanging getting advanced from September 12 to September 8 at 5.30 am, a petition was moved on Koli's behalf for stay of execution taking benefit of a recent SC verdict that all review petitions in death sentence cases should be heard in open court.
Advocate Indira Jaising mentioned the petition at the residence of Justice Dattu, who was joined later by Justice AR Dave. They thought it fit to stay the execution by a week, extending the benefit of the SC judgment of September 2. The court said, "Considering the urgency of the matter, we stay the execution of the death sentence of applicant/ petitioner for a period of one week from today."
The order was passed around 1.40 am and was soon communicated to the jail authorities. The review petition of Koli, aged 42, was dismissed by apex court on July 24, 2014.
The Supreme Court sent a fax message to the Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Ghaziabad with the direction that the same be conveyed to the concerned authority at Meerut jail. Earlier the SSP's command office received a fax at 3.45am which was in turn passed on to the Meerut jail official RK Verma, who reached the superintendent residence and handed over the stay order copy at 4.30 am on Monday.
As the Meerut Jail administration has made arrangements for the execution, media persons gathered outside the jail. A State Minister in Uttar Pradesh Government tried to meet Koli around 5 am on Monday, but was denied permission.