Delhi Bar Council issues notice to Nirbhaya convicts' lawyer

The Delhi Bar Council has issued a notice to advocate AP Singh, counsel for three Nirbhaya convicts, and sought his reply in two weeks in view of an order passed by the Delhi High Court in the 2012 Delhi gang-rape and murder case.

New Delhi:The Bar Council of Delhi on Saturday issued notice to advocate A P Singh, appearing for convict Pawan Kumar Gupta in the Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case, after Delhi High Court had last month directed it to take action against the lawyer for filing "forged" documents and not appearing for hearing.

The Bar body issued notice to Singh for February 28 and sought his reply within two weeks.

The Delhi High Court had on December 19 last year dismissed the claim of death row convict Pawan that he was a juvenile at the time of the offence in December 2012 and had deprecated the conduct of Singh for filing forged documents and not appearing in the court.

The high court had imposed Rs 25,000 as costs on advocate A P Singh, who filed the petition for Pawan.

"Justice Suresh Kumar Kait, in his order dated December 19 last year, referred the matter to Bar Council of Delhi for taking necessary action against A P Singh, who appeared in the matter on behalf of the petitioner, Pawan Kumar Gupta.

"After perusing the order passed by the court, it is unanimously decided to issue notice to A P Singh, advocate for February 28. He is directed to file his reply within two weeks from the date of receipt of the notice," the Bar Council said.

The high court had asked the Bar Council of Delhi to take action against Singh for filing forged affidavit in the court regarding the convict Pawan's age and added that without applying his mind or deliberately he filed the documents to delay the process.

Pawan has now moved the Supreme Court challenging the high court's order dismissing his claim of juvenility at the time of offence.The top court will hear the matter on January 20.

On December 19, 2019, Singh had appeared in the court at 10:30 am and mentioned the matter for seeking an adjournment on the pretext of filing some additional documents, without informing the other party.

The judge, through his staff, sent several communications via phone, SMS and e-mail to the advocate to appear before the court as the matter was to be taken up again.

However, Singh did not "bother" to come to the court when the matter was again taken up after 2:30 pm or respond to any of the communications, the judge noted in his order.

While dismissing the plea, the high court had observed it seemed that the convict's advocate was not interested in appearing in the court and it "deprecates such a practice".

Irked over the conduct of Singh, the high court had imposed Rs 25,000 as costs on the counsel for playing "hide and seek".

A Delhi court had on Friday issued fresh death warrants for February 1 against the four convicts -- Pawan (25), Vinay Sharma (26), Mukesh Kumar (32) and Akshay Kumar Singh (31) -- in the case.

President Ram Nath Kovind had rejected the mercy petition of Mukesh. The other three condemned convicts have not yet availed of the constitutional remedy of filing the mercy petitions.

The apex court had on January 14 dismissed the curative petitions of Vinay and Mukesh against their conviction and capital punishment.

The two other convicts -- Akshay and Pawan -- have not yet filed curative petitions in the top court.

A 23-year-old paramedic student, referred to as Nirbhaya, who was gang-raped and brutally assaulted on the intervening night of December 16-17, 2012 in a moving bus in south Delhi by six persons before she was thrown out on the road, died on December 29, 2012, at a hospital in Singapore.