CJI SA Bobde recuses from hearing Nirbhaya convict's plea
The CJI learned that his lawyer-nephew had earlier appeared in a related case on behalf of the deceased victim’s mother
Chief Justice SA Bobde recused himself on Tuesday from hearing the plea of convict Akshay Kumar Singh seeking review of the 2017 apex court judgment upholding his death penalty in the Nirbhaya gang rape-andmurder case, and a new bench will hear the petition on Wednesday.
After the CJI's recusal, a bench comprising Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and A S Bopanna was constituted on Tuesday evening by the apex court to hear the review plea of the death row convict at 10.30 am tomorrow.
A special bench comprising the CJI and Justices Banumathi and Bhushan commenced hearing on the review plea Akshay, 33, while asking his lawyer A P Singh to conclude the submission within half-an-hour.
After hearing the submissions for a few minutes, the CJI learned the fact that his lawyer-nephew had earlier appeared in a related case on behalf of the mother of the deceased victim. The apex court had earlier in its administrative order decided to set up a 2-judge committee of Justices Subhash Reddy and M R Shah to look into the issue of expeditious disposal of rape cases across the country.
Meanwhile, in a written reply, HM Bala Bachchan stated that the a total of 10,279 cases of rape have been reported (to the police) in Madhya Pradesh between January 1, 2018 and November 20, 2019. In fact, the number of rape cases has gone down in 2019 as against 2018, Bachchan stated citing the data. The home minister further stated that 16,493 cases of abduction have been reported to the police from January 1, 2018 to November 20, 2019.
Blaming porn sites for crimes like the Hyderabad gang rape-cum murder, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging him to ban all "porn sites and inappropriate content" available online. In the letter, Kumar expressed "pain and serious concern" over the increasing number of gang rape cases which have agitated the general public.
Meanwhile, in the Hyderabad rape case, the state-run Gandhi Hospital sought a directive from the Telangana High Court over preserving the bodies of the four accused in the rape-murder of a woman veterinarian, who were later killed in an alleged encounter with the police. The forensic professor, who preserved the bodies expressed his concern how long they could preserve the bodies. “We cannot keep bodies for any more time,” a senior medical official at the hospital said.
In the Unnao rape case, CBI requested the court to give maximum punishment to Kuldeep Sengar. "Undue sympathy would do more harm to society. The liberal view should not be adopted where the crime has a social impact including crime against women," the CBI told the court. The court adjourned till December 20 the hearing on the quantum of punishment to the convict.
In the Bulandshahr gangrape case, Salim Bawaria, the main accused in the gang-rape of a motherdaughter on a highway in 2016, died on Sunday after a prolonged kidney ailment at a government hospital.