NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to grant relief to Balwant Singh Rajoana, awarded the death sentence for the assassination of then Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh in 1995, and asked the Centre to take a call at an appropriate time on his mercy petition.
A bench of Justices B R Gavai, Vikram Nath and Sanjay Karol asked the competent authority of the Centre to decide Rajoana’s mercy plea as and when it deems appropriate. “The competent authority, as an when they deem necessary, may deal with the mercy petition and take a further decision. Petition disposed accordingly,” the bench said in its verdict.
Rajoana had approached the top court seeking to commute his death penalty for delay in considering his mercy plea. Earlier, the apex court had questioned the Central government for not taking any decision so far on the mercy petition of Rajoana.
Last year, the apex court had directed the Centre to decide within two months on the mercy petition of Rajoana seeking to commute to life imprisonment the death sentence on the ground of his long incarceration of 26 years. The top court had said it can’t tell the Centre what decision has to be taken, but the government certainly should take a decision in the matter.
Before that, it had asked the Centre to decide on Rajoana’s plea without being influenced by the fact that the appeals filed by other convicts in the case are pending in the top court. Rajoana had moved the top court seeking implementation of a decision taken by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in September 2019 to commute his death sentence to life.
He had said that the Central government had in 2019 announced its decision to commute his death penalty and grant remission to eight other convicts to mark the occasion of the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak. He had sought the implementation of that decision and alternately prayed to commute his death sentence on the ground of the long delay in considering the mercy petition.
The top court had said that it is untenable on the part of the Centre to take a stand that the proposal for commutation of the death sentence of Rajoana, a former Punjab Police constable, was not processed because of the pendency of appeals of co-accused in Beant Singh killing case.
The bench had said once the government has decided to recommend a Presidential pardon for a condemned man, the pendency of appeals in the Supreme Court of his co-accused cannot delay the process initiated under Article 72.
The convict, Balwant Singh Rajoana, was sentenced to death for the murder of former Punjab chief minister Beant Singh who died in a bomb explosion in Chandigarh on August 31, 1995. The Centre had decided on September 27, 2019, to commute the death penalty of Rajoana to a life sentence on the special occasion of the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak Dev. More than two years have passed but the decision is yet to be implemented.
A Chandigarh court had, on July 27, 2007, awarded a death sentence to Rajoana which was upheld by the Punjab and Haryana High Court on October 12, 2010. Rajoana has not filed an appeal against the decision and instead filed a mercy petition before the President. (ANI)