India’s apex court has deferred a hearing until 5 March for a petition by the federal Home Ministry seeking the execution of four convicts on separate dates.
The petition was filed with the Supreme Court after the Delhi High Court rejected the plea on 5 February. The High Court had stated that all of the convicts in the rape and murder of a 23-year-old woman should be executed together.
The new order by the Supreme Court has left people fuming, calling it “delaying tactics”.
Chief Justice of India Sharad A. Bobde on 20 February raised questions about the trial court issuing death warrants in haste without giving the convicts a chance to exhaust their efforts for commutation or clemency. He asked how black warrants could be issued even before the expiry of a 60-day time period to which a convict is entitled.
Earlier on 17 February, a Delhi court had issued fresh death warrants for the four convicts for 3 March.
On 16 December 2012, a 23-year-old paramedic student was brutally gang-raped and left fatally injured by six men in south Delhi. She died in a Singapore hospital, where she was taken after Indian doctors failed to restore her perforated intestines.
The incident led to outrage across the nation with people demanding justice for the rape of “Nirbhaya” or Fearless (not her real name). One of the accused, Ram Singh, committed suicide in jail during the trial, while another was set free after spending three years in a reform facility because he was a juvenile when the crime was committed.