Tihar jail approaches Delhi court seeking fresh date for execution of Nirbhaya convicts

Tihar jail authorities on Thursday approached a trial court in Delhi seeking a fresh date for the execution of four convicts in the Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case.

The prison authorities moved the application under Section 413 and 414 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and sought to fix a new date for the execution.

Additional Sessions Judge Dharmendra Rana has sought responses of all respondents, including the convicts, and slated the matter for hearing tomorrow.

This comes after President Ram Nath Kovind rejected the mercy petition of convict Akshay Thakur. So far, mercy petitions of Vinay Sharma and Mukesh Singh have also been rejected.

Meanwhile, the Central government has approached the Supreme Court against the order of Delhi High Court, which rejected its plea to separately execute the four convicts in the case.

Delhi High Court had, on Wednesday, granted a week's time to the four death row convicts to avail all legal remedies available to them and said that the convicts cannot be hanged separately since they were convicted for the same crime.

A Delhi court had earlier stayed till further orders the execution of the four convicts -- Akshay Thakur, Mukesh Singh, Pawan Gupta, and Vinay Sharma -- which was earlier scheduled to take place on February 1.

The case pertains to the gang-rape and brutal murder 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 Delhi. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later.

One of the five adults accused, Ram Singh, had allegedly committed suicide in the Tihar Jail during the trial of the case.