Centre's interlocutor on Kashmir Dileep Padgaonkar today said that any decision on the mercy petition of the Parliament attack mastermind Afzal Guru should be taken keeping in mind the present situation in Jammu and Kashmir.
He said personally he was 'against death penalty' in principle.
"I do not have the slightest of doubt in my mind that Afzal Guru has committed heinous crime and he has been convicted by the highest court in the country," Padgaonkar said.
However, 'the decision to carry out the punishment must be seen in the present context of Jammu and Kahsmir', he said.
Guru, hailing from the Valley, was convicted in the Parliament attack case of 2001 in which 13 persons including security personnel were killed by the hands of five terrorists of Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba.
He was sentenced to death by the Supreme Court in 2004. However, Guru's execution was stayed following a mercy petition filed by his wife. The Home Ministry has recommended rejection of the mercy petition to the President.
The Home Ministry is believed to have cited the Delhi government's recommendation which also favoured execution of Guru, an issue which has been hanging fire for seven years and has been a subject matter of intense political controversy.
PDP's plea
Jammu and Kashmir's opposition People's Democratic Party also appealed for mercy to Afzal Guru, whose mercy petition has been sent to President Pratibha Patil by the union home ministry after recommending its rejection.
The party statement said: 'The punishment, if carried out, would only add to and not take away from the trust deficit between Jammu & Kashmir and rest of the country which the union cabinet itself has described as one of the two major reasons for the alienation of the people of the state'.
Geelani's warning
Joining in the demand for clemency, Hardline Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani has warned of 'dire consequences' if Parliament attack convict Mohammad Afzal Guru was hanged.
It will unleash a 'storm', Geelani said in a statement.