Two sisters from Maharashtra, found guilty of kidnapping 13 children and killing nine of them, are to be hanged soon, said sources.

President Pranab Mukherjee has rejected the mercy petitions of Renuka Shinde and Seema Gavit; their families have been told they could be hanged any time soon.

The sisters, who belong to Kolhapur in Maharashtra, were sentenced to death in 2001.

The number of people executed in India since Independence is a matter of dispute. Government statistics claim that only 52 people have been executed since independence. However, research by the People's Union for Civil Liberties indicates that the actual number of executions is in fact much higher, as they have located records of 1,422 executions in the decade from 1953 to 1963 alone. However, there is no record of any woman's execution.

Renuka and Seema, who partnered their mother Anjanabai Gavit to kidnap the kids and push them into begging and killed some of them after they stopped being productive, are currently lodged at the Yerwada jail in Pune. Anjanabai passed away during the trial, and the sisters' father Kiran Shinde  turned approver and was acquitted.  Read more