TheSupreme Court on Wednesday dismissed the plea filed by one of the four convictsin the Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case, seeking review of its 2017 judgementupholding his death penalty.
Athree-judge bench headed by Justice R Banumathi said there are no ground toreview the 2017 verdict and the contentions raised by convict Akshay KumarSingh were already considered by the top court in the main judgement.
The bench which also comprises of justices Ashok Bhushan and AS Bopanna, said that review petition is not "re-hearing of appeal over and over again" and the top court had already considered the mitigating and aggravating circumstances while upholding the death penalty to the convict in the 2017 verdict.
The topcourt said that it found "no error" on the face of the main judgementrequiring any review.
As soon as the bench pronounced the verdict, advocate A P Singh, who appeared for convict Akshay, sought three weeks time to file a mercy petition before the President.
SolicitorGeneral Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Delhi government, told the bench thatone week time is prescribed under the law for filing the mercy petition.
Thebench said, "We are not expressing our view in this regard. If as per thelaw any time is available to the petitioner, it is for the petitioner to availthe remedy of filing mercy petition within that stipulated time."
Whilepronouncing the judgement, the bench said the convict has again sought toassail the prosecution case and the findings of courts on it and this cannot bepermitted.
Thebench also said that the grounds raised by Akshay were almost identical to thegrounds taken by the other three convicts in the case whose review pleas wererejected by the top court last year.
RegardingSingh's submission about the alleged flaws in the investigation, the benchsaid, "All these things have already been well considered by the trialcourt, High Court and the Supreme Court.
