The Nirbhaya gang-rape of 2012 triggered widespread agitation in the country
The claim of one of the four convicts sentenced to death in the Nirbhaya case that he was below 18 when at the time of the gang-rape and murder in 2012, was dismissed by the Delhi High Court on Thursday.
Convict Pawan Kumar Gupta had claimed he was a minor, "an innocent boy" at the time of the crime and should be punished under laws for juveniles - which means a lesser prison term. He also claimed that proper medical tests to establish his age were not done at the time.
The court also imposed a Rs 25,000 fine on his lawyer AP Singh for "playing hide-and-seek"; the lawyer did not appear in court despite several communications sent to him by the court. The Bar Council of Delhi has been asked to take action against the lawyer for filing a forged affidavit on the convict's age.
Besides Pawan Gupta, the others on death row after being held guilty of Nirbhaya's gang-rape, torture and killing on 16 December, 2012 are Mukesh, Vinay Sharma and Akshay Kumar Singh.
A 23-year-old medical student was gang-raped on a moving bus, tortured with an iron rod and dumped by the roadside by six men. She died in hospital days later.
One of the six accused, a juvenile who was just short of 18 when the barbaric crime took place, was released after three years in a reform home. Another accused, Ram Singh, hanged himself in jail.
The other four are on death row.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court dismissed the last review petition challenging the death sentence, by the convict Akshay Kumar Singh. All four have been given seven days to file petitions for mercy. "We don't find any merit in the review petition," said three judges.
The Tihar Jail administration issued notice to the four yesterday, said Director General Prison Sandeep Goel.