The Gujarat government’s decision to give remission to 11 convicts in the case of Bilkis Bano’s gang rape and the murder of seven of her family members during the 2002 Gujarat riots was overturned by the Supreme Court on Monday. The Supreme Court ruled that “playing fraud” on the court and omitting important facts was how the May 13, 2022 ruling—which ordered the Gujarat government to consider remission of the convict—was obtained.
The convicts had not approached the court with clean hands, the apex court observed.
Noting that the state, where an offender is tried and sentenced, is competent to decide the remission plea of convicts, the apex court held that Gujarat was not competent to pass the remission orders but the Maharashtra government.
In March 2002, during the post-Godhra riots, Bano was allegedly gang-raped and left to die with 14 members of her family, including her three-year-old daughter. She was five months pregnant when rioters attacked her family in Vadodara.
The Gujarat government had released the 11 convicts, who were sentenced to life imprisonment, on August 15, 2022. All the 11 life-term convicts in the case were released as per the remission policy prevalent in Gujarat at the time of their conviction in 2008.
Bilkis Bano and others had approached the top court, challenging the premature release of 11 convicts.
PILs were filed asking for orders to revoke the remission that had been given to eleven prisoners. The National Federation of Indian Women, whose general secretary is Annie Raja, journalist Revati Laul, professor and social activist Roop Rekha Verma, TMC MP Mahua Moitra, and member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) Subhashini Ali filed the pleas.