Ahead of the March 3 hanging of the four death-row convicts in Nirbhaya rape and murder case, one rape convict Vinay Sharma tried to hurt himself by hitting his head against a wall inside his cell, sources said on Thursday, February 20.
However, a Tihar jail official was able to stop him. "One of the death row convicts of the Nirbhaya case, Vinay, attempted to hurt himself by banging his head against a wall in his cell. He received minor injuries," a Tihar Jail official told India Today.
SC dismisses Vinay's plea
The Supreme Court on February 14 dismissed the plea of Vinay Sharma, challenging the rejection of his mercy petition by President Kovind.
READ | New death warrants: Nirbhaya convicts to be hanged on March 3 at 6 am
A bench of Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and AS Bopanna said that as pointed out earlier, the case records, judgments of the trial court, the High Court and the Supreme Court, clean copy of records of the case, nominal roll of the petitioner, medical report of the petitioner, Social Investigation Report and other relevant documents were forwarded to the Ministry of Home Affairs.
"The note put up before the President of India is a detailed one and all the relevant materials were placed before the President and upon consideration of same, the mercy petition was rejected," the court said.
As a result, it said: "We do not find any ground for the exercise of judicial review of the order of the President of India rejecting the petitioner's mercy petition and this writ petition is liable to be dismissed."
2012 Delhi gang-rape and murder case
23-year-old Nirbhaya was gang-raped and tortured on December 16, 2012, which led to her death. All the six accused were arrested and charged with sexual assault and murder. One of the accused was a minor and appeared before a juvenile justice court, while another accused committed suicide in Tihar Jail.
The remaining four -- Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Kumar Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar (31) -- will be executed together on March 3 at 6 am.
