Gang-rape convicts to file appeals in High Court

The counsel for the four death sentence convicts in the December 16 gang-rape case on Tuesday informed the Delhi High Court that they would file appeals against their conviction by the trial court.

Earlier, the four convicts--Akshay Thakur, Vinay Sharma, Mukesh and Pawan Gupta--were produced before a Division Bench of Justice Reva Khetrapal and Justice Pratibha Rani.

The Bench had on Monday asked for their production to know whether they would file appeals against their conviction.

Instead of issuing notices to them on the trial court’s reference for confirmation of their death sentence, the Bench had directed their production to know their plan on filing appeals to cut short the time as it wanted to take up the reference for hearing immediately.

Later, the Bench decided to hear the reference from Wednesday on day-to-day basis. In the meanwhile, the convicts will file their appeals within the mandatory 30 days.The counsel for the convicts wanted the Bench to hear the reference along with their appeals, but it did not agree to it.

While awarding death sentence to all the four convicts for the murder charge and referring the sentence for confirmation to the High Court, Additional Sessions Judge Yogesh Khanna had told the convicts that they could file appeals against the judgment and order on sentence within 30 days as per Article 115 of the Limitation Act, 1963.