The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed the plea of one of the four Nirbhaya case death row convicts challenging the rejection of his mercy petition by the President.

Vinay Sharma, one of the four death row convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case, had moved the apex court alleging that the rejection of the mercy plea was done in a "mala fide" manner.

A trial court had on January 31 stayed "till further orders" execution of the four convicts in the case -- Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Kumar Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar (31), who are lodged in Tihar Jail.

A bench of Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and A S Bopanna said no ground was made out for judicial review of the rejection of the mercy petition.

"The note put up before the President of India is a detailed one and all the relevant materials were placed before the President and upon consideration of same, the mercy petition was rejected," the bench said.

"We do not find any ground for exercise of judicial review of the order of the President of India rejecting the petitioner's mercy petition and this writ petition is liable to be dismissed," it said.

All material including Sharma's medical report was placed before the President, who did apply his mind in rejection of the mercy plea, it said.

The apex court dismissed the contention of Sharma that he is mentally ill, saying the medical report suggests he is stable.

The apex court had earlier dismissed a plea filed by Mukesh challenging the rejection of his mercy petition by the President.

Sharma claimed on Thursday that while rejecting his mercy plea the President did not consider his mental illness following torture in jail, an allegation denied by the Centre saying "he is fit and has sound mind".

Through his counsel, he made a last ditch effort to escape from the gallows claiming that all the relevant records were not brought before the President including that he had been subjected to torture and ill-treatment in jail due to which he had developed mental illness.

The Centre, however, had opposed his claim and produced a medical report dated February 12 which said he was fit and had a sound mind.

The top court had also rejected Sharma's counsel AP Singh's request to peruse the original file of recommendation made by the Lieutenant Governor and Delhi home minister Satyendra Jain for rejection of his mercy petition.

Singh contended that signatures of Delhi home minister and LG were not obtained on the original files recommending rejection of mercy petition of Sharma.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and NCT of Delhi, opposed the arguments of Singh and said that signatures were obtained on the original files and submitted the documents for the perusal of the court.

Now Mukesh and Vinay have exhausted all legal remedies available to them. 

The mercy petition of Akshay was also rejected by the President.

Pawan has not yet filed a curative petition -- the last and final legal remedy available to a person which is decided in-chamber. He also has the option of filing a mercy plea.

A 23-year-old psychotherapy student, dubbed by media as '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 the four convicts and a juvenile were named as accused.

The trial of the five adult men began in a special fast-track court in March 2013.

Ram Singh, the prime accused, allegedly committed suicide by hanging himself in Tihar jail days after the trial began. The juvenile, who was said to be the most brutal of the attackers, was put in a correctional home for three years.

The juvenile was released in 2015 and while four were given death sentence.

(With PTI inputs)