By IANS
New Delhi : Bilkis Bano Rasool, who was gang-raped during the 2002 communal violence in Gujarat, said Monday her fight for justice has not ended with the conviction of 13 people last week, and she would continue her fight till seven other accused were also punished.
“This judgement does not mean the end of hatred that I know still exists in the hearts and minds of many people… but it does mean that somewhere, somehow justice can prevail,” Bilkis Bano said at her first press conference here.
“This judgement is a victory not only for me but for all those innocent Muslims who were massacred and all those women whose bodies were violated only because, like me, they were Muslims,” she said with a tinge of emotion in a language that was a mix of Urdu and her colloquial Gujarati.
Still traumatised, she did not falter for words. “I shall continue my fight till the other accused are also convicted,” she said.
Notwithstanding the conviction, Bilkis Bano was reluctant to return to her village and too scared to disclose where she has been staying or how and where she lived during these five years.
During communal clashes in March 2002, Bilkis Bano witnessed 14 members of her family being massacred by a violent mob, when they were trying to escape from their riot-struck village Randhikpur, 250 km from Ahmedabad.
Six months pregnant at the time, Bilkis Bano survived the slaughter, but not before being subjected to gang rape by a savage mob.
The trial in this case had begun in Ahmedabad. However, after Bilkis Bano expressed fears that witnesses could be harmed and the evidence tampered with, the Supreme Court transferred the case to Mumbai in August 2004.
The Mumbai court Friday convicted 13 people, including a police officer, but the remaining seven accused, including five police officials and two doctors, were acquitted for want of evidence.
“Today I stand vindicated. I owe much of this victory to a large number of friends and supporters who stayed with me and held me when I faltered and felt I could not go on any more,” Bilkis Bano said.
She recalled that “for 20 days I was cross-examined in a court room and the strength of my truth saw me through.”
She expressed her gratitude to all her supporters, specially senior Supreme Court counsel Harish Salve, the National Human Rights Commission and the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI) without whose efforts she felt she could not have got justice.
She reserved her special thanks for husband Yakub “who stood by me all along”.
“I want to educate my children and lead a peaceful life,” she said.Her press interaction was arranged by social and legal activists Farah Naqvi, Gagan Sethi, Malini Ghosh and Planning Commission member Syeda Hamid, who had helped her in the legal battle.