2012 Delhi gangrape: SC likely to deliver verdict on pleas of three convicts against death penalty
The convicts had argued that they should be spared the death sentence as it amounted to ‘cold-blooded killing in the name of justice’.
The Supreme Court on Monday is likely to deliver its verdict on the review petition filed by three men convicted of raping and murdering a woman in New Delhi in December 2012.
A bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices R Banumathi and Ashok Bhushan is expected to deliver its judgement on the pleas of Mukesh, Pawan Gupta and Vinay Sharma against their death penalty. The fourth death row convict, Akshay Kumar Singh, has not filed a review petition.
Six men had raped and brutally assaulted a 23-year-old student in a moving bus in Delhi on December 16, 2012. The woman succumbed to her injuries two weeks later at a hospital in Singapore. A minor convict was released in December 2015 after serving three years in a detention home for juveniles, while one convict died in prison.
On May 5, 2017, the Supreme Court upheld the verdict of the Delhi High Court and the trial court awarding capital punishment to the four other convicts.
In January, the Supreme Court gave two convicts – Pawan Gupta and Vinay Sharma – more time to file responses in connection with their review petition against the death penalty. On May 4, the Supreme Court reserved its verdict on the plea. The convicts had argued through their lawyer AK Singh that they should be spared the death sentence as it amounted to “cold-blooded killing in the name of justice”.
