NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court trashed a desperate petition of four Nirbhaya death row convicts on Thursday night, paving the way for their hanging on Friday morning. Three of the four convicts had moved the High Court challenging the trial court’s order which declined to stay their execution. But the High Court also refused to admit their plea, saying that there is no foundation in the petition. “You can argue till 5.30 am if you want,” an irked High Court told the lawyer of the convicts, AP Singh.
Earlier in the day, a lower court had dismissed application ofthe four convicts seeking stay on their hanging. The hanging will take place in Tihar Jail complex wherein all necessary arrangements have been made to execute Pawan Gupta, Mukesh Singh, Akshay Singh and Vinay Sharma.
It will be the first time that four men will be hanged together in Tihar Jail. “All the arrangements are in place. Hangman Pawan Jallad had arrived two days ago and dummy testing and hangings have been done already,” said a Tihar official.
Soon after the court dismissed the plea seeking stay on the death warrant, Nirbhaya’s mother remarked that she will now get peace. The execution was delayed thrice following a mercy petition filed by one of the convicts. One of the convicts also filed a last minute petition to stay the execution order but it was dismissed by the apex court. Three different pleas were also rejected by the top court on Thursday. It has also refused to entertain a plea from Mukesh Singh, who challenged a High Court order that rejected his claim of not being in Delhi on the fateful night.