The
Supreme Court, on Friday, rejected the interim bail requests of Radheyshyam
Bhagwandas and Rajubhai Babulal, who were convicted of raping Bilkis Bano and
murdering her family during the 2002 Gujarat riots in Godhra.
The
convicts, Bhagwandas and Babulal, sought temporary release pending the Supreme
Court’s decision on a new remission plea. They are challenging the court’s
January ruling that cancelled their Independence Day 2022 release authorised by
the Gujarat government.
In March this year,
Bhagwandas and Babulal approached the court, arguing that the January ruling
violated a 2002 order by the Constitution bench. They requested that the matter
of their remission, cancelled by the Gujarat government, be referred to a
larger bench.
They asserted that an ‘anomalous’ situation had arisen,
with two different Supreme Court benches of equal strength issuing
contradictory opinions on the state government’s early release policy for
prisoners.
The plea submitted today stated that in May 2022,
one bench instructed the state to consider Bhagwandas’ request for early
release. However, the bench that issued the recent verdict held that
Maharashtra, not Gujarat, had the authority to grant remission.
The plea, stating that there is a possibility that
the January 8 verdict can be used as legal precedence, said, “... if this is
permitted then it would lead not only to judicial impropriety but to
uncertainty and chaos as to which precedence (sic) of law has to be applied in
future.”
The plea requested the Centre to evaluate the case for early release and
specify whether the judgment from May 13, 2022, or January 8, 2024, will be
applicable.