Nirbhaya rape convicts to be hanged on January 22

Nirbhaya's mother flashes the victory sign along with lawyers outside Patiala House Courts in New Delhi on Tuesday. Pic/PTI

New Delhi: Four convicts in the sensational 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case will be hanged on January 22 at 7 am in Tihar jail, a Delhi court said on Tuesday. Additional Sessions Judge Satish Kumar Arora pronounced the order and issued the death warrants against the four convicts - Mukesh, 32, Pawan Gupta, 25, Vinay Sharma, 26, and Akshay Kumar Singh, 31.

During the hearing, the prosecution said there was no application pending before any court or the President right now by any of the convicts and Supreme Court had dismissed the review petition of all the convicts.

While urging the court to issue the death warrants, the prosecution said, "In between issuance and execution of death warrants if the convicts want to file curative petitions they can do so." The counsel for two of the convicts - Mukesh and Vinay - said they were in the process of filing curative petition in the Supreme Court. The trial court had earlier directed Tihar jail authorities to seek within a week response from the four death row convicts as to whether they were filing mercy pleas against their
executions with the President of India.

It was hearing the applications moved by Nirbhaya's parents and the prosecution (Delhi government) seeking issuance of death warrant against the convict. The Supreme Court on December 18 had dismissed the plea of Akshay seeking review of its decision, saying review petition is not "re-hearing of appeal over and over again" and it had already considered the aggravating circumstances while upholding the death penalty. The 23-year-old paramedic student was gang raped and brutally assaulted on the intervening night of December 16-17, 2012 inside a moving bus in South Delhi by six persons before being thrown out.

Dec 2012
When Nirbhaya was gang-raped by six men

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