Pawan Gupta, a convicted rapist and murderer in 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape case, on the 28th of February, filed a curative petition before the Supreme Court (SC.)
On the 16th of December 2012, six men brutally raped and murdered a 23 year old medical student in a moving bus in Delhi. Out of the 6 criminals, Jai Singh committed suicide in Tihar jail in 2013, Sonu, a minor, was sent to a juvenile detention facility and was set free after 3 years of imprisonment.
In his petition, Pawan Gupta asked for life imprisonment not the death sentence. Recently, after postponing the execution of the death penalty twice, the Patiala Court of Delhi, issued fresh death warrants.
However, the judiciary system and legal rights of the convicts are helping them to delay the execution of their death sentence. The four remaining convicts, Mukesh Singh, Vinay Sharma, Akshay Kumar and Pawan Gupta were sentenced to death and warrants were issued twice, once on the 31st of January and then the 1st of February. The first one was postponed to 1st of February, after Mukesh Singh filed a curative petition, followed by a mercy plea to the President of India Ram Nath Kovind, whereas the next death execution date was delayed due to petitions filed by Akshay Kumar and Vinay Sharma.
Now, once again the last convict to file the petition used his legal rights and filed the curative petition just 4 days ahead of the death execution. All the four convicts were scheduled to hang on the 3rd of March, at 6:00 A.M.
Though the Delhi HC gave a 7 day deadline to file the petitions, the lawyer of the convict did not do so and argued the convict was not aware of the time frame set by the court. If the curative petition is rejected, Pawan Gupta has one more legal option which is the mercy plea before President Kovind.
Meanwhile, the Delhi High Court (HC) and the State Government are seeking permission to hang the criminals individually rather than collectively, as they are using the judiciary system to cheat the society of justice by constantly delaying their death execution.
