SC discover to Mah, Gujarat govts on attraction by 2 convicts in Bilkis Bano gang rape case| India Information
The Supreme Court docket on Tuesday requested the Gujarat and Maharashtra governments to reply to appeals filed by two convicts within the Bilkis Bano gangrape case of 2002 towards their conviction and the sentence of life imprisonment handed out to them by the Bombay excessive courtroom in 2017.
A bench of justices Rajesh Bindal and Vijay Bishnoi issued discover on the appeals moved by Bipinchand Kanaiyalal Joshi and Pradip Ramanlal Modhiya and posted the matter for listening to on Might 5.
The 2, represented by senior advocates Sidharth Luthra and Sonia Mathur, are the primary to problem their conviction within the March 2002 case amid the Gujarat communal riots when Bano was attempting to flee alongside together with her household. The riots broke out within the aftermath of the torching of the Sabarmati Categorical at Godhra on February 27, 2002.
Bano, a 21-year-old pregnant lady on the time, was gangraped and several other members of her household had been killed. Eleven folks had been charged by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which probed the case following an order of the highest courtroom in December 2003.
In August 2004, the Supreme Court docket shifted the trial to Mumbai. The designated courtroom sentenced the accused to life imprisonment in 2008. The Bombay excessive courtroom upheld their conviction and sentence on Might 4, 2017.
Luthra informed the courtroom that the delay in difficult the excessive courtroom order was on account of developments in the course of the interregnum, because the accused had been granted remission by the Gujarat authorities on August 10, 2022, after which they had been launched. Bilkis Bano and others challenged the federal government order within the prime courtroom, which set it apart in January 2024. The convicts subsequently surrendered and are at present lodged in a jail in Gujarat.
The highest courtroom’s order was handed on the bottom that the facility to grant remission on this case lay with the Maharashtra authorities, and the Gujarat authorities “usurped” this energy.
The 11 convicts had been convicted beneath sections 302 (homicide) and 376(2)(g) (gang rape) of the Indian Penal Code.