Supreme Court open its doors at 2.30 AM; No relief for #YakubMemon

The Supreme Court has today at 5am rejected a last minute plea filed by Yakub Memon to stay his execution. The Court held that it would be a “travesty of justice” to stay the death warrant. The 3-judge Bench also said that ample opportunities were given to Yakub Memon to avail all remedies..For the last 4 days, Human Rights lawyers and activists have been relentless in their pursuit to save Yakub Memon. After the Supreme Court dismissed Memon’s petition and President Pranab Mukherjee rejected his second mercy plea last night, lawyers and activists filed another petition to save Memon..In an unprecedented move, this petition was heard by Justices Dipak Misra, PC Pant and Amitava Roy, the same bench that dismissed Memon’s writ petition on Wednesday, in the Supreme Court at 3.20am just hours before Memon is set to be hanged..This special hearing was granted after senior lawyers Prashant Bhushan, Indira Jaising, Anand Grover, Vrinda Grover, Nitya Ramakrishnan approached the CJI at his residence..The petitioners’ contention was that the 14 days gap between rejection of mercy petition and date of execution as mandated in Shatrughan Chauhan’s case has not been complied with since the President rejected Memon’s mercy plea only yesterday..Yakub Memon’s lawyer Anand Grover sought 14-day stay on his execution. He argued that the mercy petition rejected by the Maharashtra Governor was filed by Yakub’s brother and the one rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee was filed by Yakub..The petitioners also argued that under the Maharashtra Jail manual, it is provided there should be 7 days gap between the day of the rejection of mercy plea and execution of the convict..The Attorney General then proceeded to make his arguments. He argued that the court should not quash a death warrant upheld 10 hours ago. He further said, “If Executive has not given mercy, then the death warrant upholds.”.He further rebutted petitioners’ arguments by stating,.“Yakub Memon is abusing the system by filing repeated mercy pleas. He can go on making representations and delay procedure. It is incorrect to say it is the first mercy plea filed by Yakub Memon as he did not distance himself from the plea filed his brother.”.Justice Dipak Mishra agreeing with the Attorney General said, “Yakub Memon never disowned the mercy petition filed by his brother.”.The hearing lasted for about one hour forty minutes. Justices Prafulla C Pant and Amitava Roy first met at Justice Dipak Misra’s residence to hear the matter but later decided to hear the plea in the Supreme Court..Special thanks to Dushyant Arora @atti_cus for live tweeting from court no.4.