The trial court judge in Nirbhaya's rape case had earlier declared that the convicts were to be hanged on January 22. The sentence was pronounced seven years after Nirbhaya, a medical student, was gang-raped on a moving bus. Fresh death warrants have now been issued, suggesting that the convicts will be hanged on February 1 at 6 am.

A mercy petition was filed by one of the convicts, Mukesh Singh, and the new warrant was issued after President Ram Nath Kovind rejected the plea. The warrant has reportedly been dated exactly 14 days from now, in accordance with a law that states that convicts to be executed must have a two-week reprieve from the time their mercy plea is turned down.

The 23-year-old victim, who was named Nirbhaya (fearless), was brutally raped, tortured with an iron rod, and murdered on a moving bus as she was returning home from south Delhi with a friend after watching a movie on the night of December 16, 2012. The four death row convicts are Mukesh, Vinay Sharma, Akshay Singh, and Pawan Gupta.