The four death-row convicts of the December 16, 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case will hang on Friday at 5.30 am inside Tihar jail where they have been lodged since their arrest.
Ram Singh, the elder brother of convict Mukesh, who was arrested along with the four other accused — Vinay Sharma, Akshay Singh, Pawan Gupta and Mukesh Kumar — had committed suicide in the jail, while a juvenile, who subjected the 23-year-old paramedic girl to unimaginable physical torture, was freed after getting a mild punishment of three years in a Juvenile Remand Home in the national Capital.
Earlier, a Delhi court on Thursday dismissed the plea of three of the convicts seeking stay on the execution.
Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Dharmender Rana dismissed the plea of Akshay Kumar, Pawan Gupta and Vinay Sharma seeking stay on the death penalty, who wanted further delay in hanging claiming that the second mercy plea of one of them was pending.
The court was informed by the public prosecutor that second mercy pleas of Akshay and Pawan were rejected on the ground that the first such plea was entertained and considered on merit.
He told the court that advocate AP Singh, counsel for the convicts, was giving false information stating second mercy plea of Pawan was pending and said that all the convicts have exhausted their legal remedies.
Singh also said convict Akshay’s wife has filed for a divorce in a city court in Bihar which was pending, to which the special public prosecutor said any other petition does not fall under the purview of legal remedy in the case.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court on Thursday refused to entertain the plea of Mukesh, who challenged a Delhi High Court order which rejected his claim that he was not in the city when at the time of crime on December 16, 2012.
A Bench of Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and AS Bopanna said the convict has exhausted all his legal remedies and no fresh evidence can be entertained at this level.
The Bench said it does not find any merit in the plea and it cannot be entertained.
The Delhi High Court had on Wednesday said there were no grounds to interfere in the detailed and reasoned order of the trial court. On Tuesday, the trial court dismissed Mukesh Singh’s plea and asked the Bar Council of India to appropriately sensitise his counsel.
The Supreme Court on Thursday also dismissed death-row convict Akshay Kumar’s plea challenging the rejection of his second mercy petition by the President.
A Bench of Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and A S Bopanna said no ground was made out in Akshay’s plea for judicial review of the decision rejecting mercy petition.
Akshay had filed the second mercy petition on Wednesday which was rejected by the President on Thursday. He had filed his first mercy plea on January 29 which was rejected on January 31.
On March 5, a trial court had issued fresh death warrants for March 20 at 5.30 am, as the date for the execution of convicts Mukesh Singh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar Singh (31).
Meanwhile, Delhi’s Tihar Prison authorities are all set for the execution of the four convicts, in Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case, scheduled on early hours of Friday. On Thursday, after several dummy runs and officials brushing up on details specified in the jail manual.