Death sentence commuted to life term for 4 of a family

Advocate Ajay Kaushik,counsel for the Central government,produced a copy of the communication sent by the President’s office last week to the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Monday,during the resumed hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by advocate Navkiran Singh of the HC.

Navkiran had filed the petition in 2006,raising the issue of mercy petitions of various condemned prisoners pending before the President. He had specifically mentioned the case of the four prisoners. A case on charges of murder,attempt to murder and criminal conspiracy was registered against the four on November 21,1991. The four were held guilty of committing a number of murders — all of them members of the same family. The four have been behind the bars since 1996. They were awarded death sentence by a lower court,which was upheld by the High Court and the apex court. The four then filed mercy petitions in 2003.