Nirbhaya’s killers seek life sentence, shot at reform

Pleading for life and mercy, two of the four death row convicts in Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case told the Supreme Court on Friday that capital punishment is violative of basic human rights and requested the court to give them a chance to reform by commuting their sentence to life imprisonment.

Appearing before a bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices R Banumathi and Ashok Bhushan, advocate A P Singh pleaded the bench to show compassion to the convicts in view of their socio-economic background and clean record before the incident.

Singh, who was appearing for convicts Vinay Sharma and Pawan Gupta, said many habitual offenders had reformed over time and his clients should also be given a chance. He said death sentence is against Indian culture of non-violence and tolerance.


The court, after a brief hearing, reserved its verdict and asked the lawyer to file his written submission. Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, appearing for the Delhi Police, said the convicts had not raised any new ground which was not dealt with by the apex court while delivering its verdict upholding the death sentence. It had earlier reserved its verdict on a review petition filed by another convict Mukesh. The fourth convict, Akshay, has not filed a review petition yet.

On May 5,2017, SC had awarded death sentence to the four convicts in the case saying their brutal, barbaric and diabolic nature of the crime shook the conscience of humanity and they deserved the extreme punishment.