E-Paper
Dhananjoy used loopholes to delay execution
Since his death sentence in 1992 by a sessions court for the gruesome act of rape and murder of a teenage schoolgirl, Dhananjoy Chatterjee has successfully used loopholes in the legal procedures to escape the gallows for over a decade.
Since his death sentence in 1992 by a sessions court for the gruesome act of rape and murder of a teenage schoolgirl, Dhananjoy Chatterjee has successfully used loopholes in the legal procedures to escape the gallows for over a decade.
Chatterjee had once before escaped the noose by a whisker in 1994, when he got a stay on his execution from Calcutta High Court and Supreme Court.
He had moved the High Court a day before February 25, 1994, the date fixed for his execution and obtained a stay from the court of Justice N K Mitra on the ground that he had moved a mercy petition before the President on February 17.
On the same day (February 24) his wife Purnima had moved the apex court seeking a stay on execution on the ground that she be allowed time to move a mercy petition before President.
The apex court granted the stay for a week till March four and a communique was received by the West Bengal Judicial Department the same evening about the stay, just hours before the scheduled execution at 4.30 a.m the next morning.
He managed two more extensions on the stay by the High Court and then an unlimited stay till disposal of his petition by the President, suppressing the fact that his wife had also obtained a stay on his execution from the apex court giving the same reason, public prosecutor for state before the High Court, Kaji Safiullah said in Kolkata on Friday.
While the mercy petition was rejected by the President on June 23, 1994, the state government did not take any step to vacate the stay by the High Court, till it came to the notice of a Judicial Department officer in October 2003.
Once the High Court was informed of the situation by the judicial department, the then Chief Justice A K Mathur assigned the matter to Justice D P Sengupta and the stay was vacated in November last.
An appeal against this order by Dhananjoy was also rejected by a division bench of the High Court a month later.
Dhananjoy had been convicted on three counts -- Section 302 (murder) IPC for which the execution order was given, Section 376 (rape) IPC for which he was sentenced to life imprisonment and Section 380 (theft inside house) IPC, for which he was sentenced to five years imprisonment.
Dhananjoy was sentenced to death on August 12, 1991, by the Second Additional Session Judge, Alipur, R N Kali.
The execution order was confirmed by a division bench of the Calcutta High Court comprising Justice M K Mukherjee and Justice J N Hore on August 7, 1992.
The convict moved the Supreme Court and his appeal was dismissed by a division bench comprising Justice A S Anand and Justice N P Singh on January 11, 1994.
His review petition before the apex court was also rejected on January 20, 1994.
He then moved a mercy petition before the West Bengal Governor on February two, 1994, which was rejected on February 16 the same year.
Following this, he had moved a mercy petition before the President, on February 17, 1994, which was rejected on June 23 the same year.
This time also Dhananjoy managed to get a last minute reprieve as Supreme Court stayed his execution for two days on a petition by his brother Bikash Chatterjee.
At the same time his wife and mother sent a mercy petition to President A P J Abdul Kalam which was forwarded to the government for consideration yesterday.
Subsequently the Union Home Ministry has asked the West Bengal government to stay the execution of Chatterjee till a decision was taken in this regard.
