Bilkis Bano moves Supreme Court against release of 11 convicts; also seeks review of verdict allowing remission as per Gujarat's 1992 policy

Gujarat riots gangrape survivor, Bilkis Bano has filed a review petition before the Supreme Court of India challenging the apex court's May 13 judgement which had held that remission of the convicts should be considered as per the the policy existing at the time of conviction in the State where the crime was actually committed..Bilkis Bano has also filed a writ petition challenging the decision of the Gujarat government to grant remission to 11 convicts who had gangraped and murdered her family members during the 2002 Godhra riots.The pleas were mentioned today by advocate Shobha Gupta before a bench led by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud for listing. The CJI said that he will examine whether both pleas can be heard together, before the same bench headed by Justice Ajay Rastogi who had rendered the May 13 judgment. .The review plea has said remission policy of State of Maharashtra should apply in present case, instead of 1992 remission policy of Gujarat since the trial had happened in Maharashtra. .A Division Bench of Justices Ajay Rastogi and Vikram Nath had in May this year observed that under Section 432(7) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) 1973, the power to remit sentence is in the hands of the appropriate government, which can either be the Central or the State government but there cannot be concurrent jurisdiction of two State governments.The top court was considering a writ petition filed by one of the convicts, Radheshyam Bhagwandas Shah @ Lala Vakil seeking direction to the State of Gujarat to consider his application for premature release under the policy dated July 9, 1992 which was existing at the time of his conviction.The petitioner was serving rigorous imprisonment for life after being found guilty of offences under Sections 302, 376(2)(e)(g) read with Section 149 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). He had filed a petition for premature release under Sections 433 and 433A of the CrPC seeking premature release stating that he had undergone more than 15 years and 4 months in jail.But his petition filed in the Gujarat High Court came to be dismissed on the ground that since the trial has been concluded in the State of Maharashtra, the application for premature release has to be filed in the Maharashtra and not in Gujarat..The Supreme Court had, however, held that the crime was admittedly committed in Gujarat and ordinarily the trial was to be concluded in the same State and in terms of Section 432(7) CrPC, the appropriate government in the ordinary course would be the Gujarat government.Therefore, since the crime happened in Gujarat, all further proceedings including plea for remission has to be considered as per the policy of Gujarat government."Once the crime was committed in the State of Gujarat, after the trial been concluded and judgment of conviction came to be passed, all further proceedings have to be considered including remission or premature release, as the case may be, in terms of the policy which is applicable in the State of Gujarat where the crime was committed and not the State where the trial stands transferred and concluded for exceptional reasons," the judgment had said.