New Delhi: The remission granted by the Gujarat government to the 11 accused in the Bilkis Bano gangrape and murder case during the 2002 riots was challenged in the Supreme Court on Tuesday.
A bench of Chief Justice N.V. Ramana agreed to look into the matter after advocate Aparna Bhat sought an urgent listing on Wednesday.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal also mentioned the matter and said: “The Supreme Court gave a discretion to the government to consider it. We are challenging the remission, not the order of the Supreme Court.”
The plea before the apex court was filed by CPI(M) leader Subhashini Ali, journalist Revati Laul and social activist and professor Roop Rekha Verma.
The Gujarat government last Monday released 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano case from the 2002 riots. The convicts, all serving life imprisonment, were released after a state government panel approved their application for remission of sentence.
Convicts serving life sentences can be granted remission and released after they have served a minimum of fourteen years. Remission means “reducing the amount of sentence without changing its character”.
As soon as the convicts were let off, visuals emerged of relatives greeting them with sweets and touching their feet outside the Godhra jail.
Bano was 19 and five months pregnant when she was gang-raped. According to the prosecution, 14 members of her family — including her three-year-old daughter Saleha — were killed by a mob in Gujarat’s Randhikpur village, when they were fleeing the Godhra riots in March 2002. Bano had been 19, and five months pregnant at the time.
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