Nirbhaya case: SC to hear review plea of convict on Dec 17

New Delhi: The Supreme Court will hear on December 17 the plea filed by one of the four death-row convicts in the Nirbhaya gang rape-and-murder case seeking review of its 2017 judgement awarding him death penalty.

A three-judge bench would hear next week the plea filed by convict Akshay Kumar Singh, whose lawyer has questioned in the review petition the capital punishment at a time life is getting "short" due to rising pollution.

"Take notice that the following matter (Akshay's review plea) will be listed for hearing on Tuesday the December 17, 2019 at 2 PM before a three judges bench," said a notice which was uploaded on the apex court's website.

The apex court had on July 9 last year dismissed the review pleas filed by the three other convicts -- Mukesh (30), Pawan Gupta (23) and Vinay Sharma (24) -- in the case saying no grounds have been made out by them for review of the 2017 verdict.

A 23-year-old paramedic student, who came to be known as Nirbhaya, was gang-raped on the intervening night of December 16-17, 2012 inside a running bus in south Delhi by six persons and severely assaulted before being thrown out on the road. She succumbed to injuries on December 29 at Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore.

One of the accused in the case, Ram Singh, had allegedly committed suicide in the Tihar Jail here. A juvenile, who was among the accused, was convicted by a juvenile justice board. He was released from a reformation home after serving a three-year term.

Akshay's review plea, filed through advocate A P Singh, referred to the health risks due to the rising pollution level in Delhi and said, "Life is going short to short, then why death penalty".

"The state must not simply execute people to prove that it is attacking terror or violence against women. It must persistently work towards systematic reforms to bring about change. Executions only kill the criminal, not the crime...," the review plea said.

(Image from deccanherald.com)