Welcoming the Delhi High Court's decision to give the four death row convicts in Nirbhaya case just a week to avail of all the legal rights available to them to avoid death sentence, the victims' mother on Wednesday said that the convicts must be hanged soon after a week.
"I welcome the Delhi High Court's order. It gives all four convicts one week to exhaust all the legal remedies available to them. After this, the convicts should be hanged soon," Asha Devi, mother of the December 2012 gang-rape and murder victim, told ANI.
She said that earlier there was no timeframe for the accused to exercise their legal rights to avoid the death penalty, which has now changed.
"This was the only problem as they were not given any timeframe to use their remedies and thus they were trying to delay the execution. Now, it is time-bound for them. I hope their mercy petition would be dismissed by the President. I request the government to not delay the hanging anymore," she added.
Nirbhaya's father, Badrinath Singh, too expressed satisfaction over the High Court's decision. He also urged the government to make changes in the jail manual to make it possible to separately hang gangrape convicts.
According to present rules, all the convicts have to be executed together, and as long as even one of them has a review plea, curative petition or mercy plea pending, none of them can be executed.
"The Delhi government came to power by promising safety for women. They should understand that nowadays there is a rise in gangrape cases in the country. The government should make provision for hanging the convicts one by one...I welcome today's high court decision," said Badrinath Singh.
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Earlier in the day, Delhi High Court granted a week's time to the four death row convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case to avail of all legal remedies available to them.
A single-judge bench of Justice Suresh Kumar Kait said that the proceedings against the convicts for the execution of death warrant will be initiated after a week.
The High Court observed that according to Delhi Prison Rules, if a mercy petition is submitted, 14-days period has to be given to the convict after the dismissal of the mercy plea.
The death warrant against all four convicts cannot be executed separately, it said.