The Supreme Court will on Friday deliver the much-awaited verdict in the December 16 Nirbhaya gang rape at around 2 pm. The matter is being heard by the apex court bench headed by Justice Dipak Misra and consisting of Justices R Banumathi and Ashok Bhushan.
The convicts – Akshay, Pawan, Vinay Sharma and Mukesh – challenged the Delhi High Court order which had sentenced them to the gallows. Earlier, the trial court also had sentenced all the four convicts to death.
It is being expected that the apex court would not grant relief to the accused as Justice Dipak Misra is exceedingly sensitive to women’s rights and liberties. He has upheld rape as depravity and not curable and recently, passed a woman-friendly judgement saying that “no woman can be compelled to love; she always has right to say no”.
Nirbhaya’s mother said that she has full faith in the judiciary and is sure that the apex court, through its ruling, will give justice to her daughter.
In December 2012, six people gang raped a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern in a moving bus. The woman succumbed to her injuries in a Singapore hospital on December 29, 2012.
One of the accused, Ram Singh hanged himself in prison, while another person, who was a juvenile at the time of the crime, was convicted in August last year and will serve the maximum sentence of three years in a reform home.
Chairperson, Delhi Commission for Women Swati Maliwal on Friday tweeted that the convicts should be given death. “There should be only death penalty for the culprits of Nirbhaya. Justice has been delayed, let it not be denied,” she tweeted.
