BREAKING NEWS: Delhi court rejects Nirbhaya gangrape case convict Vinay Sharma's plea seeking treatment for mental illness

New Delhi: Delhi's Patiala House Court on Saturday (February 22, 2020) dismissed the petition of convict Vinay Sharma, seeking direction to provide high-level medical treatment to him, claiming that he suffers from mental illness.

Vinay Sharma is one of the four death-row convicts in the 2012 Delhi rape case and has claimed that he is mentally ill and suffering from schizophrenia and head and arm injuries.

During the hearing of Nirbhaya gangrape case, the court observed, ''General anxiety and depression in case of a death row convict is obvious. In the case at hand, evidently, adequate medical treatment and psychological help have been provided to the condemned convict''. The incident happened in jail number 3 on Sunday afternoon. He got some minor injuries and was treated inside the prison premises, the jail officials said.

On February 16, Vinay had tried to hurt himself by banging his head against a wall in his cell, said Tihar Jail official on Thursday. The official added that Vinay had received minor injuries and he was taken to hospital for treatment. Sources also claimed that Vinay tried to injure himself in order to delay his hanging. A Tihar jail official said, "Vinay Sharma got hurt inside his cell after he banged his head against the wall, security personnel saw him, stooped him immediately and called the doctors.''

Earlier this week, the court directed that the four convicts in Nirbhaya gangrape case - Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Kumar Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar (31) - be executed on March 3 at 6 am. Notably, it is for the third time that the court has issued death warrants against the convicts.

Reacting to courts order, Nirbhaya's mother Asha Devi, said that the convicts are only trying to delay the execution by making false claims. She said, ''There no such requirement of treatment, the convicts are just trying to create a tactic delay to the execution process, they are only trying to mislead the court in the matter.''

Believing that the convicts will be hanged on the prescribed date, Asha Devi asserted, ''They have exhausted almost all legal remedies and I believe that they will be hanged on March 3.''

The case pertains to the gang-rape and murder of a 23-year-old paramedical student in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, by six people including a juvenile in Delhi. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later to the incident. One of the five adults accused, Ram Singh, had allegedly committed suicide in the Tihar Jail during the trial of the case.