Nirbhaya convict's wife faints outside Delhi court after order reserved on plea seeking stay on execution

A drama ensued outside the Patiala House court in Delhi as the wife of a death row convict in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case started beating herself with slippers and fainted after the order on the plea seeking a stay on their execution was reserved.

The woman, identified as Punita Devi, is the wife of convict Akshay Singh Thakur.

This came after the court reserved its order on a petition filed by the convicts seeking a stay on their execution, which is scheduled to take place on the morning of March 20.

The woman, on the other hand, has also filed for a divorce in a family court in Aurangabad district of Bihar saying that she doesn't want to live the rest of her life as a widow.

Akshay and Punita got married on May 29, 2010, in Palamu district of Jharkhand and have a 9-year-old son.

The court is scheduled to pronounce its judgement on the petition seeking stay soon.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court is also scheduled to hear a petition filed by Mukesh Singh, another convict in the case, challenging a Delhi High Court order rejecting his claim that he was not in the national capital when the crime was committed.

The four convicts, including Akshay Singh Thakur, Mukesh Singh, Pawan Gupta, and Vinay Sharma, are scheduled to be hanged to death at 5:30 am on March 20.

The case pertains to the brutal gang-rape and killing of a 23-year-old paramedical student in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, by six people including a juvenile in the national capital. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later.