By IANS
Mumbai : A city court Monday sentenced 11 of those convicted for the 2002 gang rape of Gujarat resident Bilkis Bano and the killing of her 14 relatives to life sentence while a guilty police officer was sentenced to three years in jail. All those convicted told the court they were “falsely implicated”.
The 11 convicted have also been fined Rs.34,000 each while the police officer was fined Rs.3,000.
The convicts gave their submissions on their quantum of sentence before additional sessions judge U.D. Salvi.
The sentenced were: Jaswantbhai Nai, Govindbhai Nai, Shailesh Bhatt, Radheshyam Shah, Bipinchandra Joshi, Kesherbhai Vohania, Pradip Mordhiya, Bakabhai Vohania, Rajubhai Soni, Mitesh Bhatt and Ramesh Chandana.
“The death sentence has not been awarded to the convicts since it is not a rarest of the rare case. Before inflicting the death sentence, the circumstances of the offender and the crime need to be considered,” Judge Salvi told IANS shortly after the pronouncing the verdict.
Convicted assistant sub-inspector Somabhai Gori wept before the court. “I merely followed the instructions given by my superiors and did everything in accordance with the law.” Gori was convicted to three years’ rigorous imprisonment for failing to lodge a complaint against the accused.
Another convict, Jaswant Nai, pleading innocence, claimed that he had earlier sheltered a Muslim family in his house in order to save them from a violent mob.
Radheshyam Shah, the youngest amongst all the convicts, told the court: “I have never looked at a woman with bad intentions. How can I rape a girl?”
Another convict, Bipin Chandra Joshi, pleaded to the court to consider his illness and lessen the punishment. Joshi is suffering from bone weakness and walks with the aid of crutches. Standing in the witness box, Joshi cried: “My daughter was six months old when I was arrested and now she is five years old and does not recognise me.”
Special Public Prosecutor R.K. Shah sought death penalty for two convicts, Jaswant Nai and Govind Nai, as they were directly involved in raping Bilkis Bano, and life sentences for the others.
Shah argued that the manner in which the attack was executed and the timing clearly showed that it was a premeditated attack.
Defence counsel Harshad Ponda, however, argued that since the conviction was solely based on the testimony of Bilkis Bano, there was a “slightest chance that she may be wrong”. Thus imposition of capital punishment would be a failing, Ponda contended.
Of the 20 accused in the case, 13 were convicted and seven acquitted Friday. One of those convicted died earlier. The seven acquitted include five police officers and two doctors. The doctor couple, Arunkumar Prasad and Sangeeta Prasad, was present in the court Monday when they were officially released from the case.
The couple told IANS, “We are ecstatic with the judgment and cannot stop thanking the court. No girl should go through this kind of a trauma and we are happy that justice has been delivered to her.”
The Bilkis Bano case had its origins during the Gujarat riots of March 2002. 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 away from Ahmedabad.
Six months pregnant at the time, Bilkis survived the slaughter, but not before being subjected to gang rape by a savage mob.
The trial began in Ahmedabad. However, after Bano expressed fears that witnesses could be harmed and the Central Bureau of Investigation evidence tampered with, the Supreme Court transferred the case to Mumbai in August 2004.