Curative petitions of Nirbhaya rape-murder convicts dismissed

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday (January 14) dismissed the curative petitions of the convicts, Vinay Kumar Sharma and Mukesh, in the Nirbhaya case. The duo filed the curative plea after a Delhi court issued a death warrant in their name and announced January 22 as the date of their hanging.

The five-judge bench comprising Justice NV Ramana, Arun Mishra, Rohinton Nariman, R Bhanumati, and Ashok Bhushan heard the petitions in-chamber.

Notably, a curative petition is the last judicial resort available for redressal of grievances. Now, they can move a mercy petition before the President who is empowered to commute their death sentence to life imprisonment.

After issuing a black warrant, the Delhi court had given them two weeks' time to file both the curative and mercy petitions.

Besides Vinay Kumar Sharma and Mukesh, two other convicts named Pawan and Akshay are also slated to be hanged on the same day in Delhi's Tihar Jail premises.

The four convicts were awarded capital punishment for raping a 23-year-old woman on a moving bus in the national capital on the night of December 16, 2012.