The Delhi High Court on Wednesday a plea filed by Nirbhaya rapist Mukesh Singh against the death warrant issued by a local court.

A Delhi court has issued a death warrant for four convicts, in connection with the 2012 Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case. The hanging of four convicts is scheduled for 7 am on January 22. 

However, Additional Sessions Judge Satish Kumar Arora had added while issuing the death warrant that the convicts can use their legal remedies within 14 days.  

Earlier on Wednesday, the Delhi government told the High Court that the four convicts in the 2012 Delhi gangrape cannot be hanged on January 22, a date that was scheduled for their execution. 

Standing Counsel for Tihar Jail authorities, Advocate Rahul Mehra, informed the court that the convict can only be hanged after his mercy plea is rejected by the President.

"The fate of a death convict comes to finality only after his mercy plea is rejected by the President. It can only take place 14 days after the rejection as we are bound by the rule which says that a notice of 14 days must be provided to the convicts after the rejection of mercy plea," Mehra told the court.

23-year-old paramedic student Nirbhaya was gang-raped and brutalised on a moving bus on December 16, 2012, before being dumped on the road. She was airlifted to Singapore where she died on December 29, 2012.

Six people, including a juvenile, were arrested for the crime. The juvenile was released after serving a three-year term at a juvenile home, one convict allegedly committed suicide in jail while four others - Mukesh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar Singh (31) - are set to be hanged on January 22.

Mukesh Singh filed a mercy plea before the President on Tuesday, and moved to High Court againt the death warrant issued by the sessions court.

Singh filed the mercy plea with President a day his curative petition was dismissed by the Supreme Court.

A five-judge bench of Justices NV Ramana, Arun Mishra, RF Nariman, R Banumathi, and Ashok Bhushan heard the curative petitions filed by Vinay Sharma and Mukesh Singh and subsequently rejected the pleas of the two convicted rapists.