The Supreme Court in India has ordered that eleven men freed early after being found guilty of gang raping a pregnant Muslim woman must be returned to prison.
The men were serving life terms for the attack on Bilkis Bano, as well as the murder of 14 of her family members, during anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat state in 2002.
However, they were released in August 2022 by order of Gujarat’s government.
The order, and the celebrations as they left prison, caused global outrage.
Ms Bano told the Supreme Court in a petition that the release of the men had “shaken the conscience of the society”.
The two-judge Supreme Court bench, headed by Justice BV Nagarathna, said the state of Gujarat was “not competent” to pass the remission order in the case since the men had been tried and convicted in a court in the neighbouring state of Maharashtra.
The bench added that since the government’s remission order had been nullified, the 11 convicts must return to prison within two weeks.
The landmark judgement is expected to create ripples, especially in Gujarat where Prime Minister Narendra Modi was chief minister at the time of the riots and was criticised for not doing enough to prevent the carnage.
He has always denied wrongdoing and has not apologised for what happened in the riots.
Gujarat state supported the release of the men sentenced for attacking Bilkis Bano and her family.
