A thick blanket of silence covered the courtroom at 2 pm as the judges in the Nirbhaya case began to pronounce the verdict. For nearly 15 minutes, the courtroom, jampacked with lawyers, journalists, relatives and well-wishers of the victim, listened with rapt attention.
As soon as Justice Dipak Misra declared that the accused will be hanged, there was a loud applause from the crowd of visitors even as tears rolled out of Nirbhaya’s mother’s eyes. The judge signaled for order to be restored and then continued reading the remaining portion of the judgment.