HANGING ON MARCH 3 WITH MANY IFS & BUTS

A Patiala House court here on Monday issued the death warrant for hanging of all four convicts in the Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case on March 3 at 6 AM, ignoring pleas on behalf of at least two preparing to file curative and mercy petitions.

Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana passed the order for hanging all four after being satisfied that no application was pending before any authority against the death sentences. The death row convicts get 14 days after the final verdict which means they can be hanged only after March 2.

He was acting on the applications of Delhi government and the victim’s mother Asha Devi to fix the date for hanging the convicts in view of they taking no steps within seven days given by Delhi High Court to explore all legal remedies.

There are still hiccups in execution of the death warrant, the third since the convicts moved with haste to get earlier two quashed on the ground of the pendency of their pleas.

The petitions of the Centre and Delhi government are still pending for hearing in the Supreme Court on February 20 to quash the High Court decision that all four must be hanged together and not separately. Both the governments have pressed for separate hanging and if the Supreme Court agrees, it may help in hanging of two or three on the appointed date on March 3.

Pawan Gupta (25) still has two remedies open to him that he had not explored so far unlike the three other convicts. Advocate Ravi Qazi, who was appointed as his counsel last Friday by the Court after advocate AP Singh pulled out, sprang a surprise by telling the court that he would be moving both mercy petition before the President and the curative petition before the Supreme Court.