Updated on Tuesday, October 10, 2006, 00:00 IST

Srinagar, Oct 10: Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Societies (JKCCS) today said it would present 13,748 signed petitions against the death penalty to Parliament Attack Case convict Mohammad Afzal Guru to the UN Special Rapporteur.

The JKCCS signature campaign to protest against death penalty of Guru received a wide scale support and 13,748 signed petitions were collected in a week, Chairman of the Society Pervez Imroze told reporters here on the world day against death penalty.

Imroze said the signed petitions collected by lawyers, doctors, academicians and students from different districts of Kashmir would be presented to the UN Special Rapporteur on extra judicial, summary and arbitrary executions.

The signatures would also be sent to different International Human Rights Organisations like Amnesty International for their indulgence, he said.

He said the basic object of the siganture campaign was to register protest against the "failure of the Indian legal system" in a peaceful manner.

The UN Special Rapporteur has already committed that the defedants in the proceedings leading to imposition of death penalty must benefit from the services of a lawyer at every stage of proceedings, he said.

"We believe that Afzal's death penalty is within this mandate because he met with an unfair trial," Imroze said.

Bureau Report