On Monday, the Supreme Court invalidated the Gujarat government’s order granting remission to 11 convicts involved in the gangrape of Bilkis Bano and the murder of her family during the 2002 Godhra riots. Justices BV Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan quashed the Gujarat government’s remission order, declaring it incompetent, and directed all 11 convicts to surrender before jail authorities within two weeks.
The court held that the Gujarat government lacked the authority to pass remission orders, and it should have been the Maharashtra government making such decisions. The judgment stated that the appropriate government to decide remission was the state where the accused are sentenced, not where the crime occurred or where the accused are imprisoned.
The Supreme Court also criticized the judgment of May 13, 2022, which directed the Gujarat government to consider remission of the convicts, as obtained through “playing fraud” on the court and suppressing material facts. The bench emphasized that the Gujarat government acted beyond its powers and that the remission orders were a “nullity.”
The convicts were found to have approached the court without clean hands, and the proceedings were characterized by the “suppression of facts,” constituting a fraud on the court, according to the bench. It questioned why the Gujarat government did not file a review application of the May 13, 2022, order, as it was not the appropriate government.
The Supreme Court concluded that the exercise of power by the Gujarat government was an example of “usurpation and abuse of power,” criticizing the state government for not seeking a review of the convicts’ release. The court declared the remission orders as deserving to be quashed, highlighting the violation of the rule of law and the misuse of the court’s order.
The judgment stemmed from a petition filed by Bilkis Bano and others challenging the premature release of the 11 convicts. The Gujarat government had defended the remission, stating that the convicts had completed a 14-year sentence, and their behavior was found to be good. The court rejected these justifications, declaring the remission orders as an abuse of power and a violation of the rule of law.