Gujarat govt complicit: SC in Bilkis Bano case

The Gujarat government was ldquocomplicit and acted in tandem with one of the convictsrdquo who had approached the top court with his plea for premature release in the Bilkis Bano case the Supreme Court on Monday said and slammed the state government for ldquousurpation of powerrdquo while granting remission to the convictsA bench said it fails to understand why the State of Gujarat did not file a review petition against the judgment which directed the Gujarat government to consider the plea of a convict for premature release as per the State policy of July 9 1992The Gujarat government in 1992 came out with a fresh remission policy under which pleas of those convicts who were sentenced to life imprisonment and had served a minimum of 14 years of sentence could be considered after a favourable opinion from the Jail Advisory BoardldquoTaking advantage of the May 13 2022 order of this court other convicts also filed remission applications and the Gujarat government passed remission orders Gujarat was complicit and acted in tandem with respondent No 3 convict Radheshyam Shah in this case This court was misled by suppressing facts Use of power by Gujarat was only an usurpation of power by the Staterdquo the bench saidThe top court also nullified its May 13 2022 order of another bench asking the Gujarat government to consider a remission plea of one of the convicts as the order was obtained by ldquoplaying fraud on the courtrdquoRahul Verdict showed who gives patronage to criminalsCongress leader Rahul Gandhi Monday slammed the BJP over the Supreme Courtrsquos decision to grant remission to 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano case saying the verdict has shown once again who the ldquoprotector of criminalsrdquo is In a post on lsquoXrsquo he said ldquoThe tendency to lsquomurder justicersquo for electoral gains is dangerous for a democratic system Today the Supreme Courtrsquos decision once again showed the country who gives lsquopatronage to criminalsrsquordquo ldquoBilkis Banorsquos tireless struggle symbolises the victory of justice against the arrogant BJP governmentrdquo he addedWitness welcomes verdict relatives celebrateA witness in the case on Monday hailed the verdict saying Bano received ldquojustice todayrdquo while some of her relatives burst firecrackers in Devgadh Baria town in Dahod district ldquoThese 11 convicts were handed punishment by a Maharashtra court Gujarat governmentrsquos decision to release them was wrong That is why we challenged itrdquo said Abdul Razaq Mansuri one of the witnesses in the caseCongress hits out at Gujarat BJP govtCongress claimed the Gujarat govtrsquos approach was to save the criminals rather than ensuring justice for the victim The Gujarat Congress spokesperson Manish Doshi said the Gujarat BJP government does not appear to follow the law and the ConstitutionGovernment should apologise OwaisiAIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi demanded that the BJP govts at Centre and in Gujarat apologise to Bilkis Bano in the wake of the SC ruling Reacting to the ruling Owaisi said ldquoI welcome this judgement and I hope it acts as a precedent against all the rapists in the futurerdquoThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever