Balwant Singh Rajoana, a convict in the assassination of former Chief Minister Beant Singh, has written to the President of India to know the status of his clemency petition moved by the SGPC in 2012.
Rajoana has submitted the RTI plea with the Patiala Jail Superintendent where he is currently locked up to know the status of the petition.
I have been in jail for 20 years and 9 years since death sentence was pronounced. How many more years will I have to wait for your final orders.
"I have been in jail for 20 years and 9 years since the death sentence was pronounced. How many more years will I have to wait for your final orders," asked Rajoana in his letter.
Why should I wait for the outcome of appeals by others when I have not filed any appeal myself?
"Why should I wait for the outcome of appeals by others when I have not filed any appeal myself?"
Rajoana's execution was stayed by the courts pending the outcome of appeals filed by other convicts in the same case.
While admitting that he was responsible for the assassination of former Punjab chief minister, Beant Singh, Rajoana had refused to challenge the court's decision and file a mercy petition.
The SGPC filed a mercy petition before the president of India after a court in Chandigarh had issued Rajoana's death warrants for March 31, 2012.
A special court in July 2007 had pronounced the death sentence for Rajoana along with another convict in the case, Jagtar Singh Hawara.
A former Punjab Police constable, Rajoana had refused to defend himself in the case.
Beant Singh was assassinated on August 31, 1995, in a suicide bombing that killed 17 others.
