Supreme Court to consider curative plea of Nirbhaya convict on Monday

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court will on Monday consider 'in chamber' the curative plea of one of the four death row convicts, Pawan Gupta, in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case, a day before their scheduled hanging. The curative petition will be considered by a bench of justices N V Ramana, Arun Mishra, R F Nariman, R Banumathi and Ashok Bhushan in the chamber of Justice Ramana.
Pawan (25), against whom the death warrant has been issued for execution on March 3 along with the other three convicts, has claimed juvenility to seek commutation of sentence to life imprisonment. He has filed the curative plea through lawyer A P Singh seeking setting aside of SC's earlier verdicts on appeals and review petitions in the case.
Pawan is the last death row convict in the case to move SC with his curative plea, the final legal remedy available to a person. He and another convict Akshay Singh also moved a trial court on Saturday seeking stay on the execution of death warrants. The trial court has issued notice to Tihar authorities on the pleas, directing the officials to file their response by Monday.
While Akshay has claimed he has filed a fresh mercy petition before the President of India, which is pending, Pawan said he has moved a curative plea before Supreme Court.
Nirbhaya's mother hopes SC will dismiss curative petition of convict Pawan Gupta
Delhi gang rape victim Nirbhaya's mother Asha Devi on Monday expressed hope that the curative petition of Pawan Kumar Gupta, one of the four death row convicts in the case, will be rejected by the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear today Gupta's curative petition seeking commutation of his death penalty to life imprisonment.
Speaking to ANI Asha Devi said, "Supreme Court will hear the curative petition of Pawan Kumar Gupta and I hope that the petition is rejected by the court."
"The case is clear before the court the plea will be rejected today," she said.
Asha Devi said that the law has been misused and how many times the court will postpone its own decision.
"They are misusing the law and government should look into it, how many times the court will postpone its own decision?" she asked.
She said that the process of execution is making an impact on the society and people are losing hope in the judiciary.
"The way the execution of the convicts is getting delayed, it is making an impact on society and people now are somewhere losing hope in the judiciary," she said.
She requested that all the mercy pleas pending with the President of India and all the petitions in the court be rejected "without any further delay" and the convicts be hanged on March 3.
The Supreme Court will today hear the curative petition filed by Pawan Kumar Gupta, seeking commutation of his death penalty to life imprisonment in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case.
The case pertains to the brutal gang rape and killing of a 23-year-old paramedical student in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, by six people including a juvenile in Delhi. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later.
(With inputs from ANI)