Convict files curative plea in India’s top court

One of the convicts in the Nirbhaya rape case, Vinay Kumar Sharma, filed a curative petition before the Supreme Court yesterday, days after a Delhi court fixed the date for hanging the four convicts.

A Delhi court had issued a death warrant against four convicts on January 7 and they are scheduled to be executed on January 22 at 7:00 am in the Tihar Jail premises.

Besides Vinay, other convicts Pawan, Akshay, and Mukesh Singh are facing the gallows. The court after issuing a black warrant in their name gave them two weeks' time to file both the curative and mercy petition.

A curative petition is the last judicial resort available for redressal of grievances. It is decided by the judges in-chamber.

The mercy petition, on the other hand, is filed before the President who has the power to commute it to life imprisonment.

The case pertains to the gang-rape of a woman by six persons on a moving bus in the national capital on the night of December 16, 2012.

Her assailants took turns to rape and violate her with a metal rod as the bus drove around the capital, before dumping her and the beaten-up friend in a roadside ditch.

The victim, who was later given the name Nirbhaya, died at a hospital in Singapore where she had been airlifted for medical treatment.

Tens of thousands of Indians took to the streets in protest, and the case led to a major overhaul of laws surrounding sexual assault.

It also spawned an award-winning documentary as well as a Netflix series.