Nirbhaya case: President rejects mercy plea filed by convict Pawan Gupta

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Mercy plea filed by Pawan Gupta - one of the convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case was rejected by President Ram Nath Kovind on Wednesday. Convict Pawan Gupta had filed a fresh mercy petition on Monday before the President of India, hours after the Supreme Court had dismissed his curative petition. Prior to the development, a five-judge bench of Supreme Court had also rejected the curative petition filed by Pawan Kumar Gupta. 

Earlier during the day, the Delhi High Court had declined to entertain a plea seeking direction to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) to assess the mental and physical health of the four death row convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case.

A bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice C Hari Shankar said the plea was not maintainable as it should have been first moved in the NHRC.

A Delhi court had on Monday deferred till further orders the hanging of the convicts because of pending disposal of a convict's mercy plea. All the convicts in the case were to be hanged together on Tuesday.

Pawan, 25, was the last death row convict in the case to have moved the Supreme Court with his curative plea, the final legal remedy available to a person.

Pawan and another convict Akshay Singh also moved a trial court on Saturday seeking a stay on the execution of death warrants. While Akshay claimed that he has filed a fresh mercy petition before the President of India, which is pending, Pawan said he moved a curative plea before the Supreme Court.

The trial court on February 17 had issued fresh date for execution of death warrants for March 3 at 6 am for the four convicts -- Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Pawan Kumar Gupta, Vinay Kumar Sharma (26) and Akshay Singh (31) -- in the Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case.

The mercy petitions of three convicts -- Mukesh, Vinay and Akshay -- had already been dismissed by the President.

A 23-year-old woman paramedic student, who came to be known as 'Nirbhaya -- the fearless -- was gang-raped and savagely assaulted in a moving bus in south Delhi on December 16, 2012.

She succumbed to injuries on December 29 at Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore where she was taken for better medical treatment.

A total of six people -- Mukesh Singh, Vinay Sharma, Akshay Kumar Singh, Pawan Kumar Gupta, Ram Singh and a juvenile -- were convicted in the gang rape and murder of the paramedic student. 

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