Amicus curiae in the matter said that the option of awarding jail term for the whole life to these convicts may also be considered
New Delhi : The Supreme Court on Monday reserved its verdict on the appeals filed by four death row convicts in the December 16, 2012 gangrape and murder case which shook the country’s conscience.
A three-judge bench headed by Justice Dipak Misra asked the parties concerned to file their written submissions within a week.
During the arguments, senior advocate Sidharth Luthra, appearing for Delhi Police, told the bench that these convicts had ‘brutalised’ the young woman and they deserved to be awarded death penalty.
“The offence committed by them (convicts) attracts death penalty. They have not given any mitigating circumstances which could warrant reduction of the sentence from death penalty which was awarded to them,” he told the bench also comprising Justices R Banumathi and Ashok Bhushan.
However, senior advocate Raju Ramachandran, who is assisting the court as amicus curiae in the matter, told the bench that the option of awarding jail term for the whole life to these convicts may also be considered.
Advocates AP Singh and ML Sharma, who are representing the four convicts, argued that considering their family background and young age, death penalty should not be given to them.
The convicts – Mukesh, Pawan, Vinay Sharma and Akshay Kumar Singh – have approached the Supreme Court against the Delhi High Court’s order which had confirmed the death penalty awarded to them by the trial court.
The 23-year-old paramedic was brutally assaulted and raped by six persons in a moving bus in south Delhi and thrown out of the vehicle with her male friend on the night of December 16, 2012. She had died in a Singapore hospital on December 29. –PTI
