2012 Delhi gangrape case: Patiala House court says hanging to now take place on 1 Feb; Pawan Gupta moves SC, claims he was minor at time of crime

A Delhi court has announced the second death warrant for the four convicts of the 2012 gangrape and murder case on Friday, scheduling their hanging for 1 February at 6 am, reports said. A death warrant was issued on 7 January, which had set the date for execution for 22 January, but was delayed after one of the convicts filed a mercy petition. While President Ram Nath Kovind rejected the plea on Friday, another convict, Pawan Gupta, moved the Supreme Court pleading that he was a juvenile at the time of the crime, for which the four convicts have been awarded a death sentence. According to reports, Gupta has challenged the 19 December order by the Delhi High Court when the court rejected his plea of being a juvenile when he and five others gang-raped a 23-year-old paramedic student in Delhi in December 2012. CNN-News18 reported that Gupta has sought leniency from the court on the lines that another convict, whose juvenile status at the time of the crime was proved in a court, was given. The juvenile, one of six original accused, was tried under the Juvenile Justice Act 2000 and was sent to a reformation home for to serve a three-year term.

#NewsAlert – Nirbhaya convict Pawan moves Supreme Court with juvenility plea. | @utkarsh_aanand with details.#HangThemNow pic.twitter.com/EtNm4Ez1xA

— News18 (@CNNnews18) January 17, 2020

Regarding the rejection of Singh’s plea for mercy, Public Prosecutor Irfan Ahmed informed a Patiala House sessions court that the plea had been rejected and sought new date and time for the execution. Additional Sessions Judge Satish Kumar Arora directed the jail authorities to inform the court by 4.30 pm on Friday about whether Mukesh had been informed that his mercy petition was dismissed. The 23-year-old paramedic student was gang-raped and brutally assaulted on the intervening night of 16 and 17 December 2012 inside a moving bus in south Delhi by six persons before being thrown out on the road. She died on 29 December, 2012 at Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore. With inputs from agencies