4 accused in the 2012 Nirbhaya rape & murder case are hanged: grieving parents feel relieved saying their wronged daughter’s soul now rests in peace

FOUR of the six accused in the Nirbhaya rape and murder case were hanged to death at 5.30 am IST on March 20 at Delhi’s Tihar Jail. Scores of people gathered outside the South -East Asia’s biggest jail   and chanted ‘long live Nirbhaya’. ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ as soon as their hangings were  confirmed by the jail authorities. Accused Ram Singh allegedly committed suicide during trial in the same jail and another accused in the gruesome case was sent to a juvenile remand home as he was a minor and has been set free after three years. President Ram Nath Kovind, the Supreme Court of India and a Delhi court have rejected their last-minute pleas on staying   execution. The Delhi court Thursday dismissed the plea of three of the four death-row convicts seeking stay on the execution. Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana dismissed the plea of Akshay Kumar, Pawan Gupta and Vinay Sharma seeking stay on the death penalty, saying the second mercy plea of one of them was still pending. The court was informed by the public prosecutor that second mercy pleas of Akshay and Pawan, were rejected on the ground that the first such plea was entertained and considered on merit. He told the court that advocate A P Singh, counsel for the convicts, was giving false information stating second mercy plea of Pawan was pending and said that all the convicts have exhausted their legal remedies. Singh also said that convict Akshaya’s wife has filed for a divorce in a city court in Bihar which was pending. The special public prosecutor said any other petition does not fall under the purview of legal remedy in the present case. On March 5, a trial court had issued fresh death warrants for March 20 at 5.30 am, as the date for the execution of convicts Mukesh Singh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar Singh (31). Supreme Court of India has also declined Mukesh’s plea claiming he wasn’t in Delhi at time of crime. ail officers said that on Wednesday they carried out dummy executions inside the hanging courtyard and inspected the hanging courtyard inside jail 3 again on Thursday morning. The four men had assaulted and gang raped a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern, beaten, gang raped, and tortured in a moving private bus in which she was travelling with her male friend in South Delhi on December 16,2012. The young woman died at a hospital in Singapore two weeks later.  The convicts had not expressed any last wish or will to authorities,” an official said. Death row convicts are asked about their last wish before hanging. As per prison manual, any documents, including the will of the prisoner, can be signed and attested in the presence of the jail superintendent and the district magistrate or additional district magistrate. Hundreds of people, carrying the national flag and shouting slogans of ‘long live Nirbhaya’ and ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’, gathered outside Tihar Jail since early hours of Friday with some of them distributing sweets after the four convicts in the Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case were executed, says PT. Among the people who gathered outside the jail was social activist Yogita Bhayana. She held a poster reading ‘Nirbhaya has got justice. The other daughters still await.’ “Justice has been delivered finally,” she said, adding it was a victory of the legal system. Some people distributed sweets after the convicts were hanged.

 The last hanging inside Tihar was of Afzal Guru on February 9, 2013. Guru was convicted for his role in the 2001 Parliament attack case.