The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to examine a petition seeking to amendment in the top court rules to make hearing of all the appeals in death sentence cases mandatory by a bench of five judges as it involves a vital constitutional question of the right to life and ensuring that no innocent person is hanged.
A bench of Justices B. Sudershan Reddy and S.S. Nijjar admitted a writ petition on the vital issue, filed by three AIADMK activists awarded capital punishment for burning alive three girl students in Dharampuri district of Tamil Nadu in 2000 while they were part of a mob that turned violent when protesting against conviction of former chief minister and party supremo J. Jayalalithaa in a corruption case.
While issuing the notice to the Supreme Court administration on the petition of condemned convicts C. Muniappan, Nedu alias Nedunchezhian and Madhu alias Ravindran, the bench stayed their execution till their petition is decided.
In support of their petition, the convicts cited the “I87th” report of the Law Commission submitted in 2003 recommending changes in the Supreme Court Rules, 1966, to facilitate hearing of all death penalty cases by a bench of five judges. Though strongly advocating hearing of all death cases by a five-judge bench, the law panel had said if it could not be facilitated due to some reasons, then such cases should be heard by a bench not less than three judges.
Since the review petitions of all the three AIADMK activists against the top court’s final verdict of August 30, 2010, confirming the capital punishment to them was still pending before it, their counsel K.K. Venugopal pleaded that before deciding the review, their plea on this vital question should be decided first.
Besides, they also sought changes in the SC procedure for hearing of the review petition in all the death cases in an “open court”. Currently all the review petitions are heard in the chambers by the same judges who had passed the judgment. While hearing the petitions, the court only considers if any factual mistake had cropped in the final judgment, but no new facts are allowed to be add in it.