Bilkis Bano case: SC dismisses pleas filed by convicts seeking extension of time

Bilkis Bano was 21 years old and five months pregnant when she was gang-raped while fleeing the riots in Gujarat that broke out after the Godhra train burning incident in 2002

Supreme Court on January 19 dismissed the applications filed by convicts in Bilkis Bano case seeking extension of time to surrender before jail authorities.

The time to surrender by the convicts is expiring on January 21.

''We have heard senior counsel and counsel for the applicants and the counsel for the non-applicants also. The reasons cited by applicants to seek postponement of surrender and report back to jail have no merit inasmuch as those reasons in no way prevent them from complying with our directions. Hence the miscellaneous applications are dismissed,'' the bench said.

The top court on January 8 had quashed the Gujarat government's decision to grant remission to 11 convicts in the case, saying the orders were ''stereotyped'' and passed without application of mind.

Bilkis Bano was 21 years old and five months pregnant when she was gang-raped while fleeing the riots in Gujarat that broke out after the Godhra train burning incident in 2002. Her three-year-old daughter was among the seven family members killed .

While quashing the remission granted to them, the Supreme Court slammed the state for being “complicit” with an accused and abusing its discretion. It ordered the convicts, who were released prematurely on Independence Day in 2022, to go back to jail within two weeks.

Excoriating the Gujarat government for remitting their sentences, the court had said it “usurped” the power of the Maharashtra government to grant remission. The case was transferred from a Gujarat court to a court in Mumbai, and the SC said the Maharashtra government was vested with the power to grant remission.