Nirbhaya Case: Supreme Court refuses to hear plea of Mukesh Singh

A day before the execution of the Nirybhaya gangrape convicts, the Supreme Court on Thursday refused to hear the plea of convict Mukesh Singh, challenging the Delhi High Court’s order.

The Delhi High court had rejected Mukesh Singh's petition claiming that he was not present in Delhi when the crime took place. The convict then approached the Supreme Court, challenging the dismissal by Delhi High court. The Supreme Court, however, refused to entertain Mukesh Singh's plea.

READ | Less Than 24 Hours Before The Execution, Nirbhaya Convict Mukesh Moves SC To Seek Justice

All four convicts are scheduled to be hanged on Friday at 5:30 am as per the death warrant issued on March 5.

READ | Nirbhaya Case: NHRC Dismisses Convict Mukesh's Plea Seeking Intervention In Execution

Mukesh moves SC challenging Delhi HC's order

A day ahead of execution, convict Mukesh Singh's lawyer, on Thursday filed a petition before the Registrar of the Supreme Court seeking an urgent hearing in the matter. The petition filed by Advocate Manohar Lal Sharma, through the petition, sought directions to bring call records, documents and reports of his client through any probe agency and passed appropriate directions and measures to ensure justice in the matter. However, the petition did not seek a stay on the March 20 execution.

Earlier in the day, the Supreme Court had dismissed the curative petition filed by convict Pawan Kumar Gupta challenging the dismissal of his claim of juvenility at the time of the offence.

READ | Nirbhaya: SC Dismisses Mukesh Singh's Plea Alleging 'criminal Conspiracy' By Former Lawyer

Nirbhaya convicts scheduled to hang on March 20

Earlier on Tuesday, the NHRC dismissed the plea of convict Mukesh’s mother to stay his death penalty. Pawan is one of the three convicts in the Nirbhaya case who has also moved the International Court of Justice, seeking a stay on the execution of the death sentence. As a matter of fact, the four rapists have exhausted all their legal remedies with the dismissal of their curative and mercy petitions.  

Incidentally, a three-judge Supreme Court bench comprising Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and AS Bopanna had already dismissed the juvenile plea of Pawan on January 20. Gupta had moved the SC against the Delhi High Court order which reaffirmed that Gupta was not a juvenile when he committed the ghastly crime on December 16, 2012. On March 5, Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana of Patiala House Court issued fresh death warrants for the Nirbhaya convicts setting March 20, 5.30 am as the time of execution.  

READ | Ahead Of SC Hearing, Nirbhaya's Parents Slam Mukesh's Lawyer For Wasting Court's Time