New Delhi: Yakub Memon, convicted in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, on Thursday moved the Supreme Court challenging the death warrant for his execution on July 30.
Seeking a stay of the execution, Memon sought quashing of the death warrant on the grounds that due procedure was not followed for issuing it.
The apex court on Tuesday rejected Memon's curative petition saying that it was void of merit. On the same day, Memon filed a mercy petition before the Maharashtra governor seeking commutation of his death sentence into life imprisonment.
Memon, in his petition before the Supreme Court, submitted that the death warrant was issued before he could exhaust all his legal remedies. The execution was fixed for July 30 even as his curative petition was still pending in the Supreme Court.
In his petition, he cited the apex court's May 27 verdict quashing the death warrant issued for the execution of Shabnam and her paramour Salim on the grounds of its not being in accordance with the laid down procedure and holding that the "Right to live under article 21 does not end with the confirmation of the of the death sentence by the Supreme Court".
Holding that "even when death sentence has to be executed, the human dignity is protected", the court said: "That is the reason there are many judgments as to the manner in which the execution is carried should be as painless as possible."
It held that the issuance of the death warrants by the sessions judge within six days of the apex court on May 15 upholding the death sentence of Shabnam and Salim, who killed seven members of her family including a 10-month-old child, was "unwarranted".
Memon and 11 others were sentenced to death by the Special TADA Court in July 2007 in the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts which left 257 dead and 712 were injured. The apex court by its March 21, 2013 verdict uphold his death sentence while commuting the death sentence of 10 others to life imprisonment. One other had died during the trial.
The apex court on April 9 dismissed Memon's plea for the review of death sentence verdict for the second time as it had earlier dismissed his similar plea seeking the recall of March 21, 2013 verdict.