[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

July 23



PAKISTAN:

Executing the mentally ill


Since Pakistan abandoned its moratorium on the death penalty in December, the 
state has embarked upon a relentless spree to execute hordes of prisoners who 
have been languishing for decades in death row cells all across the country. 
According to civil society groups, there are currently over 8,500 people on 
death row in Pakistan. It is no secret that the criminal justice system is 
flawed on every level. In order to secure convictions, the police relies upon 
torturing the most vulnerable to extract confessions and damning testimonials. 
The trial that follows is a script of a lack of diligence by trial courts, 
procedural oversight, records that suddenly go missing and incompetent legal 
representation. Whilst the wealthy and influential escape through the 
loopholes, the poor, mentally ill, powerless and members of religious 
minorities are rushed to the gallows - celebrated numbers in the horrific body 
count of executions that the state celebrates as an indicator of its success in 
eradicating terrorism. As the state reaches a milestone of over 176 executions 
this month, it is important to acquaint ourselves with the stories of those who 
are awaiting their deaths after Eid.

Kanizan Bibi, a woman diagnosed with severe schizophrenia, has spent the last 
26 years in prison. In 1989 she was framed as an accomplice in the murder of a 
woman and her 5 minor children. Her family maintains that the real culprits 
managed to procure their release by bribing the police into framing Kanizan 
Bibi and her co-accused for murdering the family of the latter as a result of 
an extra-marital affair. Kanizan Bibi was subjected to such brutal torture 
under police custody that she ended up incapacitated in the hospital after just 
4 days of interrogation. The police procured a forced confession from Kanizan 
which, despite her repeated recanting, was used as a basis of her conviction 
and later in the awarding of her death sentence. Kanizan Bibi's mental health 
has deteriorated rapidly throughout the course of her imprisonment. At present 
she maintains no control over her mental faculties, recognises no one and has 
been mute for over 8 years. In 2008 Kanizan Bibi was transferred from Kot 
Lakhpat Jail to the Punjab Institute of Mental Health (PIMH) for treatment on 
account of her dire psycho-social health. During her stay at PIMH, two medical 
boards have declared her as suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and as a 
result, mentally unfit to face execution. However, despite her mental 
condition, President Mamnoon Hussain has rejected her mercy petition. Kanizan's 
only relative, her elderly father, died in an accident as he was on his way to 
visit her at PIMH from their home town of Toba Tek Singh. As a result, she 
spends her days in solitude and isolation as the Home Department deliberates 
upon when to schedule her execution date.

Yet another prisoner facing the death penalty post-Eid is Khizr Hayat, a former 
police officer, who was diagnosed by jail authorities as suffering from 
paranoid schizophrenia in 2008. Throughout his time in prison he has 
experienced severe hallucinations and fits that have made him a target for 
violent attacks from his fellow inmates on several occasions. Instead of 
transferring Khizr to an independent medical facility, as requested repeatedly 
by his mother, prison authorities keep him under solitary confinement in the 
prison's hospital room, letting him out only when he gets visitors. According 
to Khizr's lawyers, he has no idea why or how long he has been in prison, that 
he is on death row, and thinks that the medication he is taking are 
anti-malaria pills.

On April 28, Munir Hussain became the 100th person to be executed by the state 
after the lifting of the moratorium on death penalty. According to his family, 
Munir was a long-term sufferer of mental illness and had no recollection of his 
life before arrest or of any of his family members at the time of his hanging.

The mentally ill comprise a big chunk of Pakistan's prison population, 
particularly those on death row. Many people enter the prison population with 
predispositions of mental illness. Such illness is exacerbated over the course 
of their incarceration as a result of a lack of access to health care, police 
misconduct, torture and harassment from other prisoners. Mentally ill prisoners 
are stuffed in Pakistan death row cells alongside other inmates. These death 
row cells, measuring 8ft x 12ft and designed to house not more than 2 prisoners 
at a time, currently hold on average 6 or more prisoners for over 23 hours a 
day. Whilst the Medical Health Ordinance was enacted in 2001 to provide 
protection and treatment to mentally ill prisoners the law receives little or 
no implementation nation-wide.

Executions of the mentally ill violate the right to human dignity under the 
Constitution and is an affront to Pakistan's obligations under international 
law. Additionally, Section 84 of the Pakistan Penal Code does not allow the 
state to punish any person suffering from a "disorder of his mental 
capabilities". There is no evidentiary basis or rational link between 
eradicating the root causes of terrorism and the government???s conveyer belt 
of en masse executions carried out regardless of the mental stability of the 
prisoners. Daily executions, particularly of the mentally insane, serves as no 
deterrent to crime and order. It is only a campaign of cruelty and vengeance 
against the most vulnerable already persecuted by a biased criminal justice 
system. The current PML-N government needs to reinstate the moratorium against 
the death penalty immediately in order to stop its repeated violations of the 
fundamental rights of its vulnerable citizens.

(source: The Nation)






INDIA:

When Justice Hangs by a Thread


More than 22 years after the nation's commercial capital, then known as Bombay, 
was rocked by a dozen coordinated blasts that left 257 dead and over 700 
injured, the Supreme Court has finally cleared the decks for the execution of 
"the driving spirit" behind the blasts, Yakub Abdul Razak Memon. A 3-judge 
bench headed by Chief Justice H L Dattu has rejected Memon's curative petition, 
the last legal remedy available to avoid execution of death sentence. The apex 
court had on April 9 this year dismissed Memon's petition seeking review of the 
death sentence upheld on March 21, 2013. President Pranab Mukherjee had earlier 
rejected his mercy petition in May last. Memon has once again sought to delay 
his hanging by filing a fresh mercy petition before the President, on the plea 
that the earlier one rejected by the President was filed on his behalf by his 
brother Suleiman.

Though he was not among the persons who carried arms and ammunition used for 
the blasts, it was Memon who stood behind the perpetrators from the start of 
the conspiracy till the end, providing finance and logistics for the dastardly 
crime. Given the enormity of his crime and the fact that there has already been 
an inordinate delay in his trial and post-trial proceedings and the masterminds 
of the blasts, his brother Tiger Memon and Dawood Ibrahim, are eluding the arms 
of law with the help of the Pakistan government, his execution will send a 
strong signal. The government should ensure that it is carried out without 
further delay.

While the debate over the efficacy of capital punishment continues, most 
countries have decided to retain it in view of the changing nature of crimes 
against the state and the society due to increasing menace of terrorism. To be 
effective, death penalty must act as a deterrent and this can be made sure only 
by ensuring a fair but speedy trial of the accused and speedy execution of the 
sentence once the accused is found guilty. The government must ensure that this 
is done without interference due to political and other extraneous factors. The 
likes of those involved in the assassination of late Prime Minister Rajiv 
Gandhi and former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh must be shown no mercy. A 
mechanism must be put in place firmly to safeguard that the law is allowed to 
take its course unfettered.

(source: Editorial, New Indian Express)

*******************

Why didn't Centre protest when governor commuted Nalini's death penalty: SC


The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Centre, which is anxious to stop Tamil 
Nadu from remitting the sentences of seven lifers in the Rajiv Gandhi 
assassination case, why it did not challenge similar exercise of the state's 
executive power through the governor to commute Nalini's death sentence to life 
term.

The Centre had rushed to the SC immediately after the Jayalalithaa government 
in February last year proposed to remit the sentences of seven Rajiv 
assassination case life convicts, including three - Santhan, Perarivalan and 
Murugan - whose death sentences were commuted by the SC for delay in deciding 
their mercy pleas.

The other 4 to be released as per Tamil Nadu's decision were Nalini, Robert 
Pais, Jaikumar and Ravi Chandran. The SC had stayed the Tamil Nadu government's 
decision on the Centre's plea.

The Centre had argued that the state was barred from exercising executive power 
under Section 432 of Criminal Procedure Code to remit the sentences since the 
suicide bomb attack by foreign nationals in conspiracy with some Indians was 
investigated by the central agency CBI.

Additionally, solicitor general Ranjit Kumar argued that once the Tamil Nadu 
government had exercised its executive power through the governor by commuting 
Nalini's death sentence, it could not have re-exercised the same power under 
Section 432 to propose remission of life sentences on the ground that the 
convicts had spent more than 22 years in prison as of February 2014.

A bench of Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justices F M I Kalifulla, P C Ghose, A M 
Sapre and U U Lalit said, "The governor according to you (the Centre) exercised 
the executive power to commute the sentence. If the commutation and remission 
powers to be exercised in this case were the sole discretion of the Centre as 
your petitions argue, why did the Centre not protest or challenge the TN 
governor's decision to commute Nalini's death penalty?"

Kumar conceded, "It is true the governor had commuted the death sentence of 
Nalini to life imprisonment and the Centre had not questioned it." However, he 
attempted to wriggle out by arguing that these accused were convicted under 
many central laws - Arms Act, Passport Act, Explosives Act and Telegraph Act - 
thus giving the Centre sole authority to consider remission of sentences of the 
7 lifers.

The bench was quick to point out that death penalty was given under Section 302 
read with Section 120B of Indian Penal Code and that all accused were acquitted 
of charges under the central legislation TADA. "The only way the Centre could 
have had a say on remission was if the SC had upheld award of death penalty 
under TADA," the bench said.

Finding himself in a spot, the SG said he was answering the seven questions 
posed by the 3-judge bench while referring the matter to the present 5-judge 
bench. "I am only arguing which could be the appropriate government and not on 
the facts of this case," Kumar said.

(source: The Times of India)

**********************

Grotesque idea of execution: Why we are curious about Yakub Memon's walk to the 
gallows


After Ajmal Kasab in 2012 and Afzal Guru in 2013, India is getting ready for 
its 3rd execution in a decade with Yakub Memon. Along with last minute debates 
on whether he is really guilty or not, and how the Indian State picks and 
chooses its execution targets, what will slowly grip the country in the next 
couple of weeks are the creepy details of his execution.

With Memon's death by hanging confirmed for 30 July, or a few days later 
because of another shot at clemency, there will be both a sense of cold fear as 
well as curiosity about his last moments: the way he is woken up - if at all he 
manages some sleep before his involuntary death - in the early hours of the 
day, asked to take a bath, fed the meal of his choice and led to the gallows. 
We would also like to know if he was terrified or took it easy.

This Indian Express report has vivid details of how the final moments of 
Memon's life will roll out. "He would be woken at 3 am and, 10 minutes later, 
will be asked to take a bath. If he wants a hot shower, it would be provided," 
the report said.

"At 3.20 am, Memon will be served breakfast, the menu for which would be 
finalised in consultation with him. If the jail canteen cannot provide the food 
he wants, it will be ordered from outside ... He will be then asked to read any 
religious book of his choice and, by 3.35 am, taken to the gallows. His hands 
will be tied behind his back, and his face covered with a cotton cap. After a 
medical officer confirms death, the news will be communicated to the state home 
department, which will inform the family."

While the rest of India is in deep sleep, Memon will have the luxury of a 
hot-bath, a sumptuous meal of his choice, and a calibrated drop to his death. 
The jail authorities would have already done a rehearsal of his execution using 
a sand-bag that weighs slightly more than him, and a rope that has undergone a 
certain production rigour.

There are also specifications as to how the noose should be prepared, how it 
should be lubricated, where exactly it should be placed around his neck, and 
how far he has to fall beneath the trap-door when the hangman pulls the lever. 
If the fall is too long, the head may be severed as had happened in the case of 
one of Saddam Hussain???s aides, and if it's too short, he will die due to 
painful strangulation. Executioners believe that if done properly, hanging 
kills instantly by breaking the neck although literature shows that it's rarely 
that easy.

After the death, "sources" at the Nagpur jail, who would have witnessed the 
hanging, will share the gripping details of Memon's last moments with their 
media friends - if he was quiet and cooperative, if he had his bath and his 
meal, and if he had done anything particularly remarkable before or during his 
slow march to the gallows.

In Kasab's case, apparently he spent about half an hour bathing and praying, 
then wore new clothes and underwent a medical check up. He didn't have any last 
minute wish and only said "I swear by Allah, I will never commit such a mistake 
again" before he was hanged. But in the case of Afzal Guru, the only detail 
that trickled out was that he was calm and wrote a letter to his wife before 
his death.

Every execution in the democratic world is a media event because of the 
plethora of emotions it evokes - mortal fear, helplessness, pain and outrage. 
For some, such as the relatives and friends of the victims of the convict, it's 
mandatory retribution and closure, while for a lot of others, it's yet another 
instance of cold-blooded murder by the State.

What's so cruel and painful about any execution is that life is literally 
snuffed out of a healthy individual by the State. That's precisely what a 
wailing mother of Australian citizen Mayuran Sukumaran, one of the Bali Nine 
convicts, told the Indonesian government before his execution in April: "He is 
so healthy and beautiful, please don't kill him." Sukumaran and 8 others, 
convicted for smuggling heroin in Indonesia, were shot dead in an island 
despite Australia's incessant diplomatic efforts. In a poignant letter to the 
Indonesian president, his mother said: "My son died knowing all his loved ones 
were close by waiting in a hotel room to hear the news that he had been 
executed." She added that with the execution, she would be punished for the 
rest of her life. International media had carried graphic details of the 
preparation for the execution.

Every execution is barbaric and the details of the last moments of the convict 
are benumbing, leading one to a state of emotional vacuum. Take a look at the 
pictures of these women on death row in China, which kills the largest number 
of people in the world, but keeps the count a state secret. The cold, 
existential emptiness that they convey will never leave you. The final walk 
towards the gallows cannot be anything, but helpless and scary.

It's this intense human interest and people's affinity to life than death that 
compelled the great American author Normal Mailer to write a 1000 page Pulitzer 
winning best-seller, The Executioner's Song, on the life of Gary Gilmore whose 
execution in 1976 generated unprecedented global attention., Gilmore's uncanny 
last words - "Let's Do it" as he faced the firing squad, was a rude awakening 
to the grotesque idea of execution. Mailer, who narrated the final moments with 
dramatic details, also went on to describe his autopsy. He wrote: "Then, he 
took out what was left of Gilmore's heart. Jerry Scott couldn't believe what he 
saw. The thing was pulverised. Not even half left. Jerry didn't recognise it as 
the heart. Had to ask the doctor. "Excuse me," he said, "is that it?" The 
doctor said, "Yup."

Much before Mailer, George Orwell also had found creative purpose in artfully 
describing an execution he witnessed in his 1931 essay, A Hanging. It was 
heart-rending, but we couldn't stop reading it because we are terrified of 
death and love life.

Memon's execution will be another setback to the campaign against death 
penalty. The only saving grace for India is that despite its free-wheeling 
death sentences, it rarely hangs people. In the last 10 years, Indian courts 
have sentenced a few hundred people to death, but only 2 have been sent to the 
gallows. But, the country then picks up cases with a political significance, 
which is defective both in law and its fairness.

(source: firstpost.com)

******************************

How the President decides matters of life and death


If Yakub Memon is hanged on July 30, he will be the 3rd death row convict to be 
executed following the rejection of their clemency pleas by President Pranab 
Mukherjee. Since he became President in 2012, Mukherjee has turned down mercy 
pleas in at least 24 cases.

Under Article 72 of the Constitution, the President can grant pardon, and 
suspend, remit or commute a sentence of death. However, the President does not 
exercise this power on this own - he has to act on the advice of the Council of 
Ministers. This too has been made clear by the Constitution.

Under the existing rules of procedure governing mercy petitions, the view of 
the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), conveyed to the President in writing, 
is taken as the view of the Cabinet, and the President decides a mercy petition 
accordingly.

Once a convict has been finally awarded the death sentence by the Supreme 
Court, anybody, including a foreign national, can send a mercy petition with 
regard to that person to the President's Office or the MHA. A mercy plea can 
also be sent to the Governor of the state concerned, who then forwards it to 
the MHA for further action.

The convict can file a mercy plea from prison through officials, his lawyer or 
family. These days, mercy petitions can also be emailed to the MHA or 
President's Secretariat.

A few years ago, the Union Ministry of Law told the MHA that the President's 
power to grant pardons, reprieves, respites or remissions of punishment under 
Article 72 was "absolute and cannot be fettered by any statutory provisions" 
under the Code of Criminal Procedure or prison rules.

The then Law Secretary, T K Vishwanathan, also said that while commuting the 
death sentence, the President could direct that the convict would remain in 
prison for the whole of his natural life, and not be released after remission 
of the term. Vishwanathan clarified that life imprisonment meant "imprisonment 
for the whole of the remaining period of the convicted person???s natural life, 
and not 14 years in prison".

Different Presidents have dealt with mercy petitions differently. Since there 
is no fixed timeframe for disposing of a mercy petition, both the MHA and 
President have sometimes sat on cases for years.

Thus, at the end of his 5-year term, APJ Abdul Kalam left behind over 2 dozen 
mercy pleas, having decided only 2 - rejecting the plea of rape-cum-murder 
convict Dhananjoy Chatterjee (2004), and commuting the death sentence of Kheraj 
Ram into life imprisonment (2006).

Kalam's predecessor, K R Narayanan, was tardier, and failed to decide a single 
mercy petition during his 1997-2002 term.

MHA data show that Presidents, with the exceptions of Narayanan and Pratibha 
Patil, have dealt with mercy petitions largely without mercy. According to 
information released by the government under the RTI Act, of the 77 mercy pleas 
decided by Presidents between 1991 and 2010, 69 were rejected. Only 8 - about 
10% - of those who sought mercy were spared the gallows. R Venkataraman 
(1987-1992) rejected 44 mercy pleas, the most by any President.

During her 2007-2012 term, Patil, the country's 1st woman President, accepted 
the mercy pleas of 30 death row convicts - pardoning, among others, Piara 
Singh, Sarabjit Singh, Gurdev Singh and Satnam Singh, who killed 17 members of 
a family at a wedding; Govindasamy, who murdered 5 relatives in their sleep; 
and Dharmender Singh and Narendra Yadav, who killed an entire family of 5, 
including a 15-year-old girl, whom Yadav had tried to rape, and her 10-year-old 
brother, whom they burnt alive.

Several Presidents have allowed their personal convictions - views against the 
death penalty or religious beliefs - to come in the way of their taking swift 
action on pending mercy petitions. Central governments have been accused of 
being guided by political considerations in making recommendations on mercy 
pleas to the President.

The MHA has sometimes jumped the queue in sending mercy petitions to the 
President - the most recent case being that of 26/11 terrorist Ajmal Kasab, who 
was hanged in November 2012. The Ministry has on occasion also changed its 
recommendation - from rejecting a mercy petition to favouring its acceptance.

On the issue of delay in deciding mercy pleas, the Supreme Court in a landmark 
judgment last year held that the death sentence of a condemned prisoner can be 
commuted to life imprisonment on the ground of delay on the part of the 
government in deciding the mercy plea.

(source: indianexpress.com)

*****************

A case for mercy


The rejection by the Supreme Court of a curative petition by Yakub Abdul Razak 
Memon, the only one sentenced to death for involvement in the 1993 Mumbai 
serial blasts, marks the exhaustion of his last judicial remedy. However, 
hanging him will be cruel and inhuman, for more than one reason. With the 
masterminds Dawood Ibrahim and 'Tiger' Memon, Yakub's brother, remaining out of 
the reach of the Indian authorities, it will only give the impression that the 
lone man available among the many brains behind the ghastly act of terrorism is 
being singled out. The other 10 men who had planted the explosives were also 
handed down the death sentence by the Designated Court, but the Supreme Court 
commuted those to life. It said Yakub held a "commanding position", as he made 
financial and travel arrangements for the other accused who later planted the 
explosives. He cannot escape the consequences of his role, but whether hanging 
him will be the appropriate punishment is something to be pondered over. The 
Memon family came under suspicion mainly because 'Tiger' Memon was the 
principal conspirator. They fuelled further suspicion by fleeing, and were 
later found to have travelled abroad on Pakistan passports. However, most of 
them, including Yakub, ultimately returned to India to face the legal 
consequences. In the overall circumstances of the case, it is certainly 
debatable whether Yakub Memon's case would fall in the category of the "rarest 
of the rare" cases the Supreme Court itself laid down would merit the death 
penalty.

Yakub Memon's impending execution on July 30 may not take place as scheduled, 
as he has shot off another mercy petition to the President. Under a landmark 
ruling in January 2014, the Supreme Court has humanised the way the state deals 
with death row convicts. In terms of that judgment, a convict cannot be 
executed for 14 days after the rejection of a clemency plea. An earlier mercy 
petition filed on his behalf by his brother was rejected by the President, but 
his own plea may have to be considered afresh. Taking into account the fact 
that in the last 22 years Yakub is the only one whose death sentence has been 
confirmed by the judiciary in the case, the executive itself can reduce his 
sentence to one of life instead of fuelling another round of litigation by 
rejecting his mercy petition. There will be an inevitable debate on how a man 
who played a significant role in the serial blasts, which left 257 dead and 713 
people wounded, could be shown any mercy. Some will see the situation on 
merits, and others will voice their principled opposition to the death penalty. 
The only way to avoid this endless debate is to abolish the cruel and 
irreversible punishment of death itself.

(source: Editorial, The Hindu)

*******************

Debate over hanging Yakub Memon: Why death penalty can't be done away with


Every time the hangman's noose is readied, the case for and against capital 
punishment springs up for animated debate in the media. The arguments are by 
now familiar. The abolitionist school says there could be a miscarriage of 
justice if subsequent events prove the innocence of the individual. They also 
argue some evidence may show the extenuating circumstances may establish that 
it wasn't cold-blooded murder. Cynics wonder how only people from the backward 
segments of the society and minorities figure in the rarest of rare list. They 
blame it on the inability of such accused to defend themselves by hiring the 
services of legal eagles. The votaries of capital punishment see merit in the 
eye-for-eye equation, the bedrock of a retributive justice system.

While Europe, barring Belarus and Kazakhstan, swears by abolition and has 
stopped awarding and executing death penalty, the US has been divided on the 
issue for long, and 18 of the 50 states have abolished the death sentence. The 
Indian law and jurisprudence on the issue is clear--- the death sentence to be 
awarded in the rarest of rare cases.

The 18 states in the US that have abolished death penalty must ponder if the 
right to possess a gun conferred by the second amendment to the US Constitution 
should prevail in their states because a gun in the wrong hands can result in 
deaths. While the right to possess a gun is often questioned in the United 
States, it ought to be abolished in states that have foresworn the death 
penalty. Arming people who can become trigger-happy and then condoning their 
crimes with a softer punishment is nothing but running with the hare and 
hunting with the hound.

Likewise, it is for the European nations like the Netherlands, Denmark and 
Switzerland that countenance euthanasia to ponder if this sits well with their 
abolitionist stance. If state taking away of life of a convict is 
reprehensible, then the act of mercy killing and doctor assisted suicide must 
be deemed equally reprehensible.

It may be contended that they are not comparable because while death penalty is 
meted out compulsorily at the instance of the judiciary, mercy killing is 
voluntary. But then this is a specious argument. If states cannot end life, it 
cannot encourage voluntary termination of one's life, which is sanctified as 
law in the Netherlands. If a convict must be allowed to live fully i.e. till 
God has ordained him to live, it is equally the duty of the state to take care 
of people suffering from pain or mental trauma rather than taking their lives, 
given the fact that a cure may emerge later.

Coming back to the basic issue, the abolitionist school for the death penalty 
misses the wood for trees. Doing away of death penalty must be presaged by a 
guarantee that the society would be free of wanton murders and killings. Can 
any government worth its salt give such a guarantee? The question is not merely 
rhetorical.

If a government cannot prevent wanton killings, it should not take up cudgels 
for those indulging in such killings. Many of the Scandinavian countries are 
pacifists but that does not mean murders and killings don't take place in the 
region. While it is debatable if death penalty is sufficiently deterrent, the 
truth is that the ends of justice would be met only if wanton murder is met 
with execution of such murderer. It is all fine to say that a lifetime 
imprisonment is more painful than death, but the reality is boredom is not an 
affliction that affects every prisoner uniformly.

The sentimental amongst the abolitionists contend that a death penalty 
penalises the family more the convict. That is maybe, but the poignant truth is 
all premature deaths are God's punishment against the family rather than 
against the deceased. The one who dies prematurely leaves behind a distraught 
family often unable to fend for itself economically and emotionally.

******************************

Yakub Memon moves SC again seeking stay on death penalty


Yakub Abdul Razak Memon, the sole death row convict in the 1993 Mumbai serial 
blasts case, on Thursday moved the Supreme Court seeking stay of execution of 
his death sentence scheduled for July 30.

Memon, in his petition said that all legal remedies have not been exhausted and 
he has also approached the Maharastra Governor with a plea for mercy.

He had filed the mercy plea before the Governor immediately after his curative 
petition was dismissed by the apex court on Tuesday.

A 3-judge bench headed by Chief Justice H.L. Dattu had on July 21 rejected 
Memon's plea saying that the grounds raised by him does not fall within the 
principles laid down by the apex court in 2002 in deciding the curative 
petition, the last judicial remedy available to an aggrieved person.

Memon, in his plea, had claimed he was suffering from schizophrenia since 1996 
and remained behind the bars for nearly 20 years. He had sought commutation of 
death penalty contending that a convict cannot be awarded life term and the 
extreme penalty simultaneously for the same offence.

The apex court on April 9 this year had dismissed Memon's petition seeking 
review of his death sentence which was upheld on March 21, 2013.

Memon's review petition was heard by a three-judge bench in an open court in 
pursuance of a Constitution bench verdict that the practice of deciding review 
pleas in chambers be done away with, in cases where death penalty has been 
awarded.

The apex court, on June 2, 2014, had stayed the execution of Memon and referred 
his plea to a Constitution bench as to whether review petitions in death 
penalty cases be heard in an open court or in chambers.

Memon had sought review of the March 21, 2013 verdict of the apex court 
upholding his death penalty in the case relating to 13 coordinated bomb blasts 
in Mumbai, killing 257 persons and injuring over 700 on March 12, 1993.

Yakub Memon is the younger brother of Tiger Memon, the prime absconding accused 
in the case.

Chronology of 1993 bomb blasts case

March 12, 1993: Serial blasts shattered the city at 12 locations including 
Air-India Building, Bombay Stock Exchange and Centeur and Sea Rock Hotels in 
which 257 people were killed and another 713 injured

June 1995: Trial begins in TADA court in Mumbai housed in high-security Central 
Prison

August 6, 1994: Yakub arrested when he arrived at Delhi Airport from Khatmandu

September 2006: 100 accused, including Yakub, were convicted. 20 were given 
life sentences. Among them was film star Sanjay Dutt who was given 5 years jail 
term for possessing weapon in notified area under TADA.

July 27, 2007: Death sentence awarded to Yakub by TADA Judge P D Kode. 11 
others also got capital punishment. Yakub was found guilty of Conspiracy (IPC 
section 120-B) for causing terror acts under TADA, arranged tickets for accused 
to go to Pakistan for arms training and brought vehicles used for planting 
bombs used in the serial explosions

March 21, 2013: Supreme Court upheld death sentence awarded to Yakub by TADA 
Court but commutes death sentence of 10 others to life term. One convict dies 
in jail

2014: President Pranab Mukherjee rejects Yakub's mercy petition

April 10, 2015: Supreme Court rejects review petition filed by Memon

April 29: Special TADA Judge G Sanap fixes July 30 as the date of execution

May 2015: Yakub lodged in Nagpur central prison files a curative petition in 
Supreme Court

July 21: Supreme Court dismisses curative petition of Yakub, confirms death 
sentence

July 21: Yakub Memon files mercy plea before Maharashtra Governor

July 23: Memon moves Supreme Court again seeking stay on death penalty

(source: manoramaonline.com)