India | Delhi court dismisses plea by father of one of the 4 Nirbhaya convicts

The four convicts in the Nirbhaya case- Mukesh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar Singh (31)

Delhi court Monday dismissed a plea filed by the father of one of the four death row convicts in the Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case, challenging the court's order rejecting his complaint questioning the credibility of the sole witness in the case.

Judge A K Jain dismissed the appeal filed by Heera Lal Gupta, father of Pawan Kumar Gupta, saying he appear to be "desperate and mala fide".

The court however took into account that his son is one step away from the gallows and did not impose any cost on him.

It said: "The complaint was filed before the trial court for initiation of action for perjury, in view of the tweets of newspaper editor, against the eye witness in the case, however trial has already completed. The complaint therefore rightly dismissed by the trial court via order dated January 6, 2020.

"The acts of complainant who is the father of convict Pawan Kumar Gupta appear desperate and mala fide, however when his son is one step away from the gallows, no costs are required to be imposed. The present revision petition has no merits."

During the hearing, the additional public prosecutor, appearing for the police, told the court that Pawan was trying to stall the proceedings of execution by moving such petitions through his father without any locus.

Advocate Seema Kushwaha, appearing for the rape victim's mother, said: "The victim is running pillar to post for justice and convicts are inventing one or other procedure to delay the execution."

Advocate A P Singh, appearing for Pawan's father, claimed that Pawan was a victim of media trial and proper hearings were not provided to him.

The sole eyewitness, a friend of the 23-year-old victim, was accompanying her in the bus when the gruesome incident took place and he had also sustained injuries.

A magistrate court had on January 6 dismissed Heera Lal's complaint seeking an FIR against the sole witness in the matter for allegedly giving interviews to various news channels after charging money.

Pawan's father had challenged the magistrate's order in the sessions court.

A Delhi court on January 20 issued death warrants for February 1 against the four convicts -- Vinay Sharma (26), Akshay Kumar Singh (31), Mukesh Kumar Singh (32) and Pawan (26) -- in the case.

In December last year, Nirbhaya's parents had approached the court to fast-track the procedure to hang all four convicts in the case.

The Supreme Court on December 12, 2018, dismissed a PIL seeking direction to the Centre to execute the death penalty awarded to the four convicts.

Nirbhaya is the given name of the December 2012 victim, a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern, who was raped and brutalised in a moving bus in South Delhi by six people.

She had boarded the nearly vacant bus in Munirka in South Delhi along with her male friend on her way back home on December 16 that year. After raping and brutalising the woman and beating her friend, the assailants had thrown them out of the bus.

After receiving initial treatment in New Delhi for a few days, she was shifted to the Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore, where she succumbed to injuries on December 29, 2012.

Source: indiatoday.in, PTI, January 27, 2020

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