Delhi court issues notice to Tihar Jail on Nirbhaya convicts' plea seeking stay on execution

A Delhi court on Wednesday issued a notice to Tihar Jail authority and prosecution on a petition filed by the convicts in the Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case seeking a stay on their execution, which is scheduled to be held on March 20.

Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana will take up the matter at 12 noon tomorrow.

Advocate AP Singh, appearing for the convicts, sought a stay on the execution of death warrant on the ground of pendency of various legal applications, appeals and second mercy plea of a convict.

Public prosecutor Irfan Ahmad strongly opposed the plea on the ground of maintainability.

"Akshay Singh Thakur has moved his second mercy petition before the President of India, while Pawan Gupta's curative petition challenging the court's order on his plea of juvenility has been filed before the Supreme Court," Singh told the court.

It is also highlighted in the petition that the convicts' application challenging their death penalty is also pending before the International Court of Justice, he added.

In his application, Singh also cited the coronavirus pandemic and the security measures taken by various states to curb the same as a ground to argue that the situation is not cohesive to execute the convicts.

This comes as the four convicts in the 2012 case -- Mukesh Singh, Akshay Singh Thakur, Pawan Gupta, and Vinay Sharma -- are scheduled to be hanged at 5:30 am on March 20. Notably, the execution of the convicts has already been rescheduled three times.

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 the national capital. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later.