2012 Delhi gangrape: Nirbhaya's witness to the brutal assault that is now ending on its own
Delhi Gang Rape: When people still remember that painful and dark night of 16 December 2012, the soul trembles. This heinous incident stunned the entire nation and led to fierce protests all over the country. The accused were hanged in 2020 after an 8-year legal battle.
Nirbhaya Gang Rape Story: 16 December 2012 Sunday... Night time and Delhi's shivering cold... Even today, when people remember that black night, the soul trembles. The second week of the last month of 2012 wreaked havoc on Delhi's Nirbhaya. On December 16, 2012, Nirbhaya (name changed) was gang-raped in a moving bus (2012 Delhi gang rape). After this, he was thrown out of the bus in the freezing cold night. The bus (DL01PC0149) in which the incident took place is still parked on the edge of East Sagarpur Ground in Delhi.
The whole country was shaken 12 years ago.
Even today there are traces of that cruel night.
According to the Hindustan Times report, IPS officer Chhaya Sharma says that people believe that the crime took place at the spot where the woman's body was dumped, but the actual place of the crime was a moving bus. Where there are still traces of that cruel night. Bus number DL01PC0149 is still parked in a dilapidated condition on the edge of the East Sagarpur plain, which is a witness to that incident.
All 6 accused arrested within 10 days
Nirbhaya was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital on December 16, 2012. The accused were identified by the police the same day, including bus driver Ram Singh, his brother Mukesh Singh, Vinay Sharma and Pawan Gupta. The next day, all four were arrested. On December 21, the fifth accused, a juvenile, was arrested from Delhi's Anand Vihar bus terminal. The sixth suspect, Akshay Thakur, was arrested from Aurangabad in Bihar on December 22.
That painful night in Delhi...
Nirbhaya had left a mall in Saket with her friend and was waiting for a bus at a bus stop in Munirka. After waiting for a long time, no bus came, so both of them were getting upset. Meanwhile, at around 9.30 pm, a white bus stopped and the conductor called them to the bus. The bus was empty, due to which both of them were a little hesitant, but still both of them boarded the bus in a hurry to go home. Soon after, the conductor closed the door. There were a total of 6 people, including the driver, in the bus and they started molesting them as soon as they went some distance. When she protested, they assaulted Nirbhaya and her friend and gang-raped her in a moving bus. They both were thrown out of the bus on a chilly night.
After 8 years of long battle, the culprits were hanged.
After the incident, passers-by informed the police and Nirbhaya was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi. However, on December 25, the condition started deteriorating, when the government shifted him to Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore. However, after a 17-day battle, Nirbhaya was defeated and died on December 29 in a Singapore hospital.
Ram Singh had allegedly committed suicide inside Tihar Jail on March 11, 2013. On September 10, 2013, the court convicted Mukesh, Vinay, Akshay and Pawan of 13 offences, including gangrape, unnatural offence and murder of Nirbhaya and an attempt to murder her male friend. On September 13, 2013, the court sentenced four convicts to death. The juvenile was convicted after a trial and sent to a correctional home. The Delhi High Court upheld the death sentence awarded to the convicts on March 13, 2014.
On March 15, 2014, the court stayed the execution of two convicts Mukesh and Pawan on their appeal. Later, the Supreme Court stayed the execution of other convicts. After spending three years in a correctional home, the juvenile was released in 2015. On February 3, 2017, the Supreme Court said it would hear afresh the aspect of awarding the death penalty to the convicts. On March 27, the Supreme Court reserved the verdict and on May 5, the Supreme Court upheld the death penalty of four convicts, calling it the rarest of rare cases. On 8 November 2017, Mukesh moved the Supreme Court for a review of the decision to uphold the death penalty, which was opposed by the Delhi Police.
On December 15, 2017, Vinay Sharma and Pawan Kumar Gupta also moved the Supreme Court for review of their decision. However, on July 9, 2018, the Supreme Court dismissed the review petitions of the three convicts. On 10 December 2019, Akshay filed a petition in the Supreme Court for review of his death sentence, but on 18 December, the Supreme Court also rejected Akshay's review petition.
On December 19, 2019, the Delhi High Court dismissed Pawan Kumar Gupta's plea, claiming that he was a juvenile at the time of the crime. On January 7, 2020, a Delhi court ordered the four convicts to be hanged on January 22 at 7 am in Tihar Jail. Then on January 14, 2020, a 5-judge bench of the Supreme Court dismissed the curative petitions filed by two convicts Mukesh Singh and Vinay Sharma. However, on January 17, 2020, President Ram Nath Kovind rejected Mukesh Kumar's mercy petition.
On 17 January 2020, a Delhi court issued fresh warrants for the four convicts to be hanged on 1 February at 6 am. After this, Mukesh Singh and Akshay Thakur again reached the Supreme Court, but the court rejected the petition of both. On 31 January 2020, the trial court in Delhi suspended the death warrant till further orders, as the mercy petitions of Vinay Sharma and Akshay Thakur were pending. On February 1, President Kovind rejected Vinay Sharma's mercy petition. On February 5, President Kovind rejected Akshay Thakur's petition.
On 14 February 2020, the Supreme Court dismissed Vinay Sharma's appeal against the rejection of his mercy petition. On February 17, the trial court issued a fresh death warrant for the four convicts to be hanged at 6 am on 3 March. Feb 29: Akshay Thakur and Pawan Gupta file plea in a local court in Delhi seeking a third stay on their execution scheduled for March 3. He had sought life imprisonment instead of the death penalty. On March 4, President Ram Nath Kovind rejected Pawan Gupta's mercy petition.
On March 5, a Delhi court ordered the hanging of the four convicts at 5.30 am on March 20, the fourth death warrant issued by the court in the case. March 6: Akshay Thakur, Pawan Gupta and Vinay Sharma move the International Court of Justice (ICJ) seeking a stay on their death sentences. On March 17, Akshay Thakur filed a second mercy petition before President Ram Nath Kovind, while on March 18, the Delhi High Court dismissed Mukesh's plea, in which he claimed that he was not in Delhi at the time of the crime.