The Union home ministry has rejected the mercy petition of Parliament attack convict Mohammed Afzal Guru, who is on the death row, and has communicated this to President Pratibha Patil.
Official sources said the ministry sent its recommendation to the President last week, citing the heinous nature of the crime and reiterating that there could be no ground for mercy. The mercy petition had been filed four ago by Tabassum, wife of Afzal Guru.
Delhi Lieutenant Governor Tejinder Khanna sent the file on Afzal Guru to North Block on June 3. The file was sent after 16 reminders from the home ministry to the Sheila Dikshit government.
Afzal Guru was sentenced to death by a sessions court on December 18, 2002 for the 2001 militant attack on Parliament House. The verdict was upheld by the Delhi High Court on October 29, 2003 and by the Supreme Court on August 4, 2005.
Subsequently, the sessions court set October 20, 2006 as the date for hanging Afzal Guru but his wife filed a mercy petition. The petition was referred by the ministry to the Delhi government but the Dikshit government sat on it for nearly four years. This prompted the Opposition BJP to accuse the UPA government of being soft on terrorists.
With the ministry communicating its rejection of the plea, it is now up to the President to take a call on the fate of Afzal Guru. Patil, exercising her powers under Article 72 of the Constitution, had recently commuted death sentences of three murder convicts to life terms.
Sources pointed out that the President, under the 44th Amendment, can send the advice of the council of ministers for reconsideration. But if the council of ministers sends the same advice again, the President ?shall act in accordance with the advice tendered after such reconsideration?.