The Supreme Court today reserved its judgment in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case. The convicts in the case had sought to commute the death penalty to life sentence due to delay in deciding their mercy plea.

The Centre has opposed the plea by arguing that the convicts did not go through torture, agony and dehumanising experience during pendency of the mercy pleas. The Centre told the apex court that there has been a delay in deciding the mercy plea, but it is not unreasonable, unexplainable and unconscionable to commute the death sentence.

The Centre further told the Supreme Court that it is not a fit case for commuting death sentence.

Last week, the apex court had said that prisoners convicted in the case deserve the death sentence while refusing to go into the merits of their conviction.