New Delhi : Mohammad Afzal, convicted and sentenced to death in the December 13, 2001 Parliament attack case, is to appeal to President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam with a mercy petition seeking pardon.

Afzal's lawyer, Anand Padmanabhan, told The Hindu that Afzal agreed to file a petition following a sessions court order fixing October 20 as the date of execution. He said the mercy petition ought to have been filed after the Supreme Court dismissed the petition seeking review of its judgment confirming the death sentence awarded to him by the trial court and affirmed by the High Court. But Afzal did not want to seek mercy stating that once the petition was filed it would amount to accepting the guilt. In view of the subsequent developments he had now agreed to file the mercy petition.

The charges against Afzal included murder, criminal conspiracy and waging war against the country. He was slapped with the death sentence treating the offence as one of the rarest of rare cases warranting the sentence.

Quoting the Jail Manual, Mr. Padmanabhan claimed that once a mercy petition was forwarded to the President by the jail authorities, the execution would have to be stopped pending disposal of the petition.

Apart from the mercy petition he would also be filing a curative petition in the Supreme Court against its judgment. (Normally, after a review petition is rejected, a curative petition can be filed and a five-judge Constitution Bench will hear the petition).

Mr. Padmanabhan said along with the curative petition an application would also be filed seeking stay of the execution.

He pointed out that a curative petition filed by another convict Shaukat Hussain, sentenced to undergo 10 years' rigorous imprisonment was pending before the apex court. This petition and the one to be filed by Afzal could be heard together, he said.

Wife hopes to be heard

PTI reports from Srinagar:

Afzal's wife Tabasum Guru, who is to appeal to the Presidentto pardon him,said: "We will go to him [President] on behalf of our children and his [Afzal's] mother and make an appeal for mercy. We are hopeful that he will hear our appeal."

She said Afzal told her that he would prefer to go to the gallows rather than appeal against the sentence. But she would persuade him to fight.

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