Overview
- Justices J.K. Maheshwari and Vijay Bishnoi dismissed the petition as withdrawn after indicating no inclination to issue directions.
- Justice Maheshwari questioned why the matter had received six adjournments, noting it would have been dismissed on the first day before his bench.
- Advocate Varun Thakur said the 87-year-old convict is extremely ill and has spent 31 years in prison without a day of parole, arguments the bench did not accept.
- Additional Solicitor General K.M. Nataraj said the Union government will act on the mercy plea once Karnataka, as the prosecuting state, provides its view.
- In 2008 the Supreme Court commuted Shraddhanand’s death sentence to life imprisonment without remission, and later review and parole attempts, including one in September 2024, were rejected.