Seeking support for Bilkis Bano, Bharatiya Janata Party leader Khushbu Sundar on Wednesday said that it is an insult to humankind if those involved in the brutality with her are allowed to roam free.
Sundar took to Twitter and said, "A woman who is raped, assaulted, brutalised and her soul scarred for life must get justice. No man who has been involved in it should go free. If he does so, it's an insult to humankind and womanhood. #BilkisBano or any woman, needs support, beyond politics n ideologies. Period."
Earlier in the day, the Supreme Court issued notice to the Gujarat government on a plea challenging the remission granted by the State to 11 convicts who had gang-raped Bilkis Bano and murdered her family members during the 2002 Godhra riots.
A bench of Chief Justice of India NV Ramana and Justices Ajay Rastogi and Vikram Nath sought a response from the Gujarat government and posted it for hearing after two weeks. It also asked petitioners to make 11 convicts parties in the case.
The apex court in its order stated, "Issue notice. File your reply. We direct the 11 convicts to be impleaded in the case."
The plea before the apex court was filed by members of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) Subhashini Ali, journalist Revati Laul, and social activist and professor Roop Rekha Verma.
The plea sought setting aside of order granting remission to 11 convicts and directing their immediate re-arrest.
Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra also moved the apex court against the early release of 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano case.
The plea filed by three women said they have challenged the order of competent authority of the government of Gujarat by way of which 11 persons who were accused in a set of heinous offences committed in Gujarat were allowed to walk free on August 15, 2022, pursuant to remission being extended to them.
The petition said the case which led to the conviction of the 11 convicts was investigated by the CBI, accordingly, the grant of remission solely by the Gujarat government without any consultation with the Central government is impermissible in terms of the mandate of Section 435 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
"The remission in this heinous case would be entirely against public interest and would shock the collective public conscience, as also be entirely against the interests of the victim (whose family has publicly made statements worrying for her safety)," read the plea.
The Gujarat government released the 11 convicts, who were sentenced to life imprisonment, on August 15.
Meanwhile, all the 11 life-term convicts in the case were released as per the remission policy prevalent in Gujarat at the time of their conviction in 2008.
In March 2002 during the post-Godhra riots, Bano was allegedly gang-raped and left to die with 14 members of her family, including her three-year-old daughter. She was five months pregnant when rioters attacked her family in Vadodara.
( With inputs from ANI )
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