Days after the Gujarat government's remission policy allowed the release of 11 Bilkis Bano rape case convicts, the victim's lawyer, Shobha Gupta, criticised the action.
New Delhi: Days after the Gujarat government’s remission policy allowed the release of 11 Bilkis Bano rape case convicts, the victim’s lawyer, Shobha Gupta, criticised the action. After this, she claimed, every person convicted of rape or murder would ask for remission. According to her, the decision to let the person go seems to have been made without considering how heinous the act was.
“I think every rape and murder convict will apply for remission after 14 years. She said if a remission can be granted in this case, then why won’t every single rape convict ask for a remission?
When Bilkis was 20 years old, she was brutalised by men she had allegedly known for years. At that time she was pregnant as well. She called one of them “Chacha ” (uncle) and the other “brothers,” respectively. She was left nearly lifeless after being gang-raped. She saw the deaths of her family members. On March 3, 2002, her three-year-old daughter was also killed.
Shobha Gupta also added that remission is bad in law and that it is not a matter of right. She also said the 1992 policy, under which the release of the convicts was granted, does not exist anymore.
After receiving the death threats, the Supreme Court decided to relocate the trial from Gujarat to Mumbai in 2004.
A special CBI court in Mumbai found 11 of the 20 accused guilty in January 2008 on charges of conspiracy to rape a pregnant woman, murder, unlawful assembly, and other offences under various sections of the Indian Penal Code.
