Another Nirbhaya gangrape convict files mercy petition

New Delhi: Akshay Thakur, one of the convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case, on Saturday filed a mercy plea, jail officials said.

Thakur and three other convicts were to be hanged on Saturday but a city court indefinitely postponed their hanging.

“Akshay Thakur filed a mercy plea before President Ram Nath Kovind on Saturday,” Director General (Prison) Sandeep Goel said.

Earlier in the day, the President rejected the mercy plea of another accused, Vinay Sharma.

The 23-year-old physiotherapy intern, who came to be known as ‘Nirbhaya’ (fearless), was gangraped and savagely assaulted on the night of December 16, 2012, in a moving bus in South Delhi. She died of her injuries a fortnight later in a Singapore hospital.

Six people — Mukesh, Vinay, Akshay Kumar Singh, Pawan Gupta, Ram Singh and a juvenile — were named as accused.

The trial of the five adult men began in a special fast-track court in March 2013.

The prime accused, Ram Singh, allegedly committed suicide by hanging himself in Tihar jail days after the trial began. The juvenile, who was said to be the most brutal of the attackers, was put in a correctional home for three years.

He was released in 2015 and sent to an undisclosed location amid concerns over a threat to his life. The juvenile, when released, was 20 years old.

Mukesh, Vinay, Akshay and Pawan were convicted and sentenced to death in September 2013.