Executing Memon; Gross Travesty of justice; Former Judges and Jurists [Read the Petition]

Yakub Memon is scheduled to be hanged on July 30 at Nagpur Central Prison after his curative petition was dismissed by the Supreme Court on Wednesday. The apex court would hear on Monday his plea for a stay on his execution. Read the LiveLaw story here.Justice Dave had led the Bench which in April dismissed Memon’s petition for a review of his death penalty. It was after this that he had moved a curative plea before the apex court. That petition was also dismissed for lack of merit earlier this week by a Bench led by the Chief Justice Dattu and which also included Justice Dave. However, on June 23, Memon again moved the Supreme Court seeking stay of execution of his death sentence. The court further clubbed an application by the Death Penalty Litigation Clinic associated with National Law University, Delhi.Former Supreme Court judge Justice Markandey Katju today said that there has been "gross travesty of justice" in the case of Yakub Memon. He said, "This evidence is retracted confession of the co-accused and alleged recoveries," alleging it as a very weak stand.“The cooperation of Yakub with the investigating agencies after he was picked up informally in Kathmandu and his role in persuading some other members of the family to come out of Pakistan and surrender constitute, in my view, a strong mitigating circumstance to be taken into consideration while considering whether the death penalty should be implemented,” B Raman(former Additional Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat) wrote in an unpublished article, reviewed by The Indian Express two days ago.Supreme Court judge Justice Harjit Singh Bedi in a letter to The Indian Express stated clearly his reasons against the imposition of death penalty, emphasising on the fact that all mitigating factors in favour of an accused facing a capital sentence must be put before the court and that this obligation rests equally on the prosecution as well, which was not the case here. In February 2013, Justice K.T.Thomas, who was part of the Bench which sentenced the assassins of Rajiv Gandhi to death said it would be "constitutionally incorrect" to hang themSenior lawyer KTS Tulsi said that the government should reconsider Yakub Memon's mercy petition. He added by saying, "I think it (mercy petition) should be reconsidered, he has rendered us valuable help in being able to collect evidence against Pakistan." "He (Yakub) gave us very valuable inputs, which were verified and found to be correct.. The nation should show gratitude to this man for having given us valuable evidence, there seems to be genuine turn of heart in him." The senior lawyer's comments came after Bollywood actor Salman Khan in a controversial tweet said that Yakub Memon should not be hanged as the real culprit is the latter's brother Tiger Memon.The Times of India quoted the home department, led by Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis stating, "All the issues raised by Yakub in his fresh mercy petition have been raised in his mercy petition before the President of India and curative petition before the apex court. Since his mercy petition as well as curative petition has been dismissed, we do not see any substance in his fresh mercy petition. As such, we feel that it should be dismissed.”The Hindu today published the text of a petition submitted to President Pranab Mukherjee on Sunday by a group of eminent jurists, MPs, leaders of political parties and eminent individuals from different walks of life, requesting him to consider the mercy plea against the execution of the death sentence of Yakub Memon. The signatories include Senior Jurist and Rajya Sabha Member Ramjethmalani.Here is the full text of the PetitionHis Excellency,The Hon’ble President of IndiaRashtrapati Bhavan,New DelhiSubject: New Mercy Petition Urging Stay Against Imminent Execution of Yakub Abdul Razak MemonMay it Please Your Excellency:This is a mercy petition for Yakub Abdul Razak Memon, who is scheduled to be executed on 30 July 2015 as per the execution warrant issued by the TADA Court.We, the undersigned, through this petition urge Your Excellency to stay the imminent execution so that the substantive and fresh grounds raised herein can be considered on merits.A. Preliminary Grounds1. An International Commitment to abolish death penalty – We the signatories of this mercy petition humbly make the statement that in India death penalty cannot be imposed till such time Parliament of India decides not to abolish death penalty and the reason for the same are as under:The universal declaration of Human Rights adopted by the General Assembly on 10.12.1948 defined certain human rights and fundamental freedoms which need to be protected. Among the subsequent human right documents, the most important are the two covenants adopted by the General Assembly in 1966: The Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and its Optional Protocol and the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. India became a party to both these covenant by ratifying them on...

Executing Memon; Gross Travesty of justice; Former Judges and Jurists [Read the Petition]

Simran Sahni

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