Written by: Press Trust of India
2 min readChennaiOct 29, 2011 01:18 AM IST
First published on: Oct 29, 2011 at 01:18 AM IST
Strongly opposing the petitions by three Rajiv Gandhi assassins challenging their death sentences,the Centre on Friday said the delay in the disposal of the clemency pleas was not a valid ground for commutation of capital punishment.
However long it may be,is not a mitigating circumstance or can be construed as a valid ground for commutation of death sentence and in any event does not reduce the gravity of the crime, the Centre said in its counter-affidavit in response to the petitions filed by Murugan,Santhan and Perarivalan.
On August 30,a Division Bench comprising Justices C Nagappan and M Satyanaryanan,had stayed the execution for eight weeks.
When the petitions came up on Friday,the judges adjourned the hearing on the petitions to November 29 as the Supreme Court was hearing a petition for transferring the petitions to another high court. In the affidavit on behalf of the Centre,Joint Secretary Judicial in the Home Ministry,J L Chugh,pointed out that the power of the President under Article 72 of the Constitution is a discretionary power which cannot be taken away by any statutory provision.
The power cannot be altered,modified or interfered with in any manner whatsoever by any statutory provision or authority,the affidavit said,adding that exercise of power under Article 71 of the Constitution is not curtailed by any limitation as to the time frame within which such power conferred might be exercised.
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