Whether 1993 Mumbai blasts convict Yakub Memon will hang on Thursday will be decided today by a Supreme Court bench set up by the Chief Justice of India after a sharp divide between two judges.
The 53-year-old chartered accountant is to be hanged at a jail in Nagpur for his role in the deadly terror attack in which 257 people were killed in blasts at various landmarks across Mumbai.
Chief Justice HL Dattu set up a larger bench that will now decide on Yakub’s petition to stop the hanging on grounds that there had been flaws in procedure.
On Tuesday, Justices Anil Dave and Kurien Joseph gave a split verdict on the petition.
Justice Dave said Yakub’s execution must not be stopped, quoting a Sanskrit shloka to say: “If the king doesn’t punish the guilty with red eyes then the entire sin will come on the king.”
Justice Kurien Joseph, however, said that there had been a clear violation of procedure and “such technicality should not stand in the way to protect the life of a person.”
Yakub Memon has pleaded that the death warrant for his execution is illegal because it was issued before he had exhausted every legal option; his curative petition challenging the Supreme Court’s ruling had not been heard then. It was rejected last week. His lawyers also said judges who ordered the death sentence should have been part of the bench that decided on the curative petition.
Justice Joseph agreed that the curative petition had not been dealt with correctly, and that the defect “needs to be cured otherwise there will be clear violation of Right to Life of the convict.”
Of the 11 sentenced to death for the terror attack, Yakub was the only convict not granted mercy.
A group of eminent citizens, including politicians, jurists and retired judges, have asked President Pranab Mukherjee to grant mercy to Yakub, arguing that in comparison, “the other 10 planted the bombs and played a much more critical and direct role.”
Yakub’s brother Tiger Memon, the main accused along with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, has been missing since 1993.