Supreme Court agrees to constitute special bench to hear Bilkis Bano's plea against remission to convicts in gang-rape case

New Delhi, March 22

The Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to constitute a special bench to hear a plea by Bilkis Bano, who was gang-raped during the 2002 Gujarat riots, against the remission of sentence of 11 convicts in the case.

A bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and justices PS Narasimha and JB Pardiwala assured Bano, represented through her lawyer Shobha Gupta, that the new bench would be formed.

Gupta mentioned the matter for urgent hearing and said a new bench needed to be constituted.

“I will have a bench constituted. Will look at it this evening,” the CJI said.

Earlier, on January 24, the hearing on Bano’s plea challenging the remission of sentence of 11 convicts in the gang-rape case by the Gujarat government could not be held in the top court as the judges concerned were hearing a matter related to passive euthanasia as part of a five-judge Constitution bench.

Besides the plea challenging the release of the convicts, the gang-rape survivor had also filed a separate petition seeking a review of the apex court’s May 13, 2022 order on a plea by a convict.

Seven members of Bilkis Bano’s family were also killed during the 2002 Gujarat riots.