Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari condemned the suggestion made by senior lawyer Indira Jaising to pardon the Nirbhaya convicts, and questioned her links with Kejriwal-led government

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday accused the Arvind Kejriwal-led government of ‘trying to save’ the four death row convicts in the Nirbhaya gangrape case instead of ensuring justice to her family, as it trained guns at the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) over delay in their hanging.

At a press conference held at the party headquarters, Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari also condemned the suggestion made by senior lawyer Indira Jaising to pardon the Nirbhaya convicts, and questioned her links with the Arvind Kejriwal government.

Mr. Tiwari also referred to Ms. Jaising’s representations of Mr. Kejriwal’s government in the past as he sought to put the AAP dispensation in the dock over her remarks.

“The Tihar jail comes under the Delhi government, and the convicts, who should have been informed about the 2017 verdict soon after, were informed two years later in 2019,” Mr. Tiwari claimed.

“It shows that first the AAP-led government delayed the hanging and now trying to save the four convicts,” he alleged. “And then, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia holds a press conference to say, ‘police is delaying’ the proceedings,” Mr. Tiwari added.

A 23-year-old paramedic student, who came to be known as Nirbhaya, 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, including the four death row convicts, before being thrown out on the road. She succumbed to her injuries a fortnight later at a hospital in Singapore.

Nirbhaya’s father on Saturday had said that Ms. Jaising should be ashamed of herself for suggesting pardon for the four convicts in his daughter’s gruesome gangrape case and added that his family is not as ‘large-hearted’ as Congress leader Sonia Gandhi.

He also demanded an apology from Ms. Jaising, who is known for her stand against capital punishment.

In a tweet on Friday, Ms. Jaising has said that she fully identifies with the pain of Nirbhaya’s mother and urged her to follow the example of Sonia Gandhi who forgave Nalini (one of the seven life convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination) and said she did not want death penalty for her.

“We are with you but against death penalty,” she said.

BJP national general secretary Saroj Pandey and party leader Shazia Ilmi were also present during the press conference.

Ms. Pandey also sought to link suggestion made by Ms. Jaising to the AAP government and said, “This is the worst form of politics.”

“Jaising herself is a woman, she should have thought a thousand times before making that suggestion. And, people very well know her link with the AAP... We condemn this,” she added.

Ms. Pandey said that Nirbhaya’s mother and her family, and the entire country waited for justice for them, but it is being delayed. Ms. Ilmi also linked the senior lawyer’s remarks and her prior association with the Kejriwal-led party. She alleged that the Kejriwal government had changed the Tihar Jail Manual, and a notice was to given to the convicts when their appeals were rejected by a court in 2017, upholding the sentence awarded earlier.

“That notice was to be given in May 2017 but instead given to them in October 2019. Isn’t that a criminal lapse?” Ms. Ilmi added.