Remission to Bilkis Bano’s rapists: Congress calls it indelible stain; as per law: BJP

Aditi Tandon

New Delhi, October 18

A day after the Gujarat Government told the Supreme Court that it had obtained the Centre’s concurrence before granting remission to 11 life convicts in the March 2002 Bilkis Bano case which the CBI had investigated, the Congress equated the move to a stain on the ruling dispensation that “will never wash off”.

Face-off over remission to Bilkis Bano’s rapists

The government defended the decision as Union Minister Pralhad Joshi, speaking to a TV channel on Tuesday, said everything was done as per the law. The minister’s reference was to a lenient July 9, 1992, remission policy that makes no exception for heinous crimes as against a 2014 policy that does.

Nothing wrong

I don’t find anything wrong in it because it’s done as per the process of law. There is a provision for release of all convicts who have spent due time in prison. Pralhad Joshi, union minister

No application of mind

Haven’t come across a counter-affidavit where a series of judgments are quoted. Where is the factual statement, where is the application of mind? Supreme Court

Reprehensible move

Reprehensible that an elected government chose to release convicts in such a cavalier manner. It’s a stain on this government’s legacy that will never wash off. Abhishek Singhvi, Congress

Has a dig at pm

Talk of respect for women from the ramparts of the Red Fort but in reality support for ‘rapists’…The difference between the PM’s promises and intentions is clear. Rahul Gandhi, Congress

The Supreme Court had in May this year, while hearing the remission pleas of the convicts, ordered that the remissions would be considered under the 1992 policy. The SC had also said the Gujarat Government was the appropriate government to consider the remission applications even though the trial had happened in Maharashtra. The court had then directed the Gujarat Government to consider the remission pleas in two months. The remissions were ultimately issued on August 10 and the convicts walked out of the Godhra jail on the occasion of the 76th Independence Day (August 15).

As the political face-off brewed on the release of the convicts, the apex court today referred to the Gujarat Government’s 458-page reply on the petitions challenging the remissions as “bulky”, and noted that these did not contain factual statements. Granting time to petitioners—CPM’s Subhashini Ali, Revati Lalu and Roop Rekha Verma—to respond, the SC posted the matter for November 29.

Bano, pregnant then, was gang-raped on March 3, 2002, in the wake of Gujarat riots. Seven members of her family, including her minor daughter, were murdered.

The CBI investigated the matter and a special CBI court in Mumbai on January 21, 2008, sentenced 11 men to life imprisonment. The Congress today took exception to the Gujarat Government’s reply in the apex court that the Home Ministry in a July 11, 2022, letter approved the premature release of convicts even as it knew that the proposal was opposed by Superintendent of Police, CBI, Special Crime Branch, Mumbai; and the Special Civil Judge (CBI), City Civil and Sessions Court, Greater Bombay.

“It is repugnant, reprehensible and revolting that an elected government chose to release these convicts in such a cavalier manner. The premature release is a stain on this government’s legacy that will never wash off,” Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi said.

He alleged that when the convicts were released on August 15, the government had maintained deliberate silence and it was only now that, constrained by the SC orders, it had revealed that the Home Ministry actually approved the release. “The sole underlying calculation for the government was a raw political one,” Singhvi said.

Earlier today, the SC Bench headed by Justice Ajay Rastogi observed, “I have not come across a counter-affidavit where a series of judgments are quoted (in Gujarat Government’s reply). Factual statement should have been made. A very bulky counter. Where is the factual statement, where is the application of mind?”

The Bench directed that the reply filed by the Gujarat Government be made available to all parties.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta also concurred with the SC observations that several judgments had been quoted and there were no counter affidavits. “The judgments were mentioned for easy reference, it could have been avoided,” Mehta said, adding “strangers and third parties” could not challenge the remission of sentence and release of the convicts.