After theSupreme Court rejected review petition of Akshay Kumar Singh, one of theconvicts in the 2012 Delhi gangrape case, three of the four convicts have toldTihar authorities that they still have the option of a curative petition beforefiling the mercy plea.
According tothe reply filed in response to a notice issued to them last week, the convictshave said that although the Supreme Court has rejected their review petitionbut they are still left with the option of filing a curative petition.
A curativepetition is the last legal recourse available to a convict and it is generallyconsidered in-chamber.
On December18, authorities had issued a notice to convicts of the Nirbhaya gangrape andmurder case to file mercy petition within seven days.
Theauthorities had informed the four convicts that they have seven days to filethe mercy petition.
"If theconvicts do not file mercy petition within the given time, then we will submitthe report to the concerned court," a senior jail official said.
On December18, the Patiala House court adjourned for January 7 the hearing on the issuanceof death warrants against the convicts in the December 16, 2012 case.
The courtgave a week¡¯s time to know whether the four convicts are filing mercypetitions, hours after the Supreme Court dismissed the last review plea againstthe capital punishment.
Theparamedic student was raped on the intervening night of December 16-17, 2012,inside a running bus in south Delhi by six persons and severely assaultedbefore being thrown out on the road.
She died onDecember 29, 2012, at Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore, where she wasairlifted from Delhi for treatment.