Every rape convict will now apply for remission: Bilkis Bano's lawyer on release of rapists
India Today
Bilkis Bano's lawyer has said every rape convict will now apply for remission after the release of 11 convicts in the rape case of Bilkis Bano.
Days after 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano rape case were released under the Gujarat government's remission policy, her lawyer Shobha Gupta criticised the move. She said that after this, every rape and murder convict would apply for remission. She said the decision to release comes across as a 'non-application of mind on the grossness of the crime'.
"I think every rape and murder convict will apply for remission after 14 years. If a remission can be granted in this case, then why won't every single rape convict ask for remission?" she said.
Read: Undo this harm, give me back my right to live: Bilkis Bano after release of rape convicts
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.
Bilkis was 20 years old and several months pregnant at the time she was subjected to brutality by men she had apparently known for years. She referred to one of them as ‘Chacha’ (uncle) and the others as brothers. She was gang-raped and left almost lifeless. She saw her family members being killed. Her three-year-old daughter was also murdered on March 3, 2002.
On regaining consciousness, Bilkis borrowed clothes from a tribal woman and went to the Limkheda police station in Dahod district to register a complaint. The head constable there suppressed facts and wrote a truncated version of the complaint.
It was just the beginning of her ordeal in pursuit of justice. She received death threats, prompting the Supreme Court, in 2004, to move the trial out of Gujarat to Mumbai.
