Delhi gang-rape case Sentencing of four convicts on Friday the 13th
Source: The Sangai Express / Agencies

New Delhi, September 11 2013: A fast-track court, which convicted four persons in the December 16 gang rape-cum-murder case, on Wednesday fixed September 13 for pronouncing the quantum of sentence to be awarded to them.

Additional sessions judge Yogesh Khanna reserved the order on punishment after hearing arguments of the prosecution, which sought death penalty for the four, and the defence lawyers.

The Delhi Police sought death penalty for the four for brutal gang rape and cold-blooded murder of the 23-year-old girl.

Advancing arguments on quantum of sentence, special public prosecutor Dayan Krishnan said the death sentence should be awarded to the four convicts � Mukesh (26), Vinay Sharma (20), Pawan Gupta (19) and Akshay Thakur (28) � as the case falls in the category of "rarest of rare" cases.

The defence lawyers, however, sought a lenient punishment for the convicts, saying life imprisonment in such a case is a rule while death penalty is an exception.

During the arguments, the prosecutor told the court that the convicts do not deserve any mercy, as they killed the helpless girl who kept on pleading for mercy.

"The crime is not only grotesque and diabolic in nature but the barbaric behaviour of the convicts was of the highest kind.

Maximum sentence has to be given as the court should see that they have raped and killed a helpless girl, even as she pleaded for her life," he said.

He said people at large are watching this case and if the convicts are awarded a lighter punishment, the public will lose faith in the judicial system.

"This is an extreme case of depravity and sexual assault of a young girl, who could not survive after their gruesome attack and gangrape.

"The act to damage the girl's intestines intentionally leaves no scope of sympathy," the prosecutor argued.

PTI .

I am innocent, convict shouts on way to court : One of the men convicted in the fatal gang rape of a young woman in the national capital called out his innocence on Wednesday as police drove him into the courthouse where he and three other men now face the possibility of death sentences.

It was not clear which of the four convicted men was shouting, because his face was obscured behind the police van's heavy metal mesh, but he repeatedly called, "I am innocent, I am innocent" as the van drove past the reporters.

The men face either life imprisonment or death by hanging.

Calls for the men to be executed have grown increasingly loud, with everyone from the victim's parents to top political leaders demanding all four be hanged.

A court convicted the four on Tuesday in the December gang-rape of the woman on a moving bus, a brutal crime that galvanized public anger over the sexual violence faced by Indian women.

The men's lawyers have long said they are innocent, and any confessions had been coerced by police torture.

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