Rape Cases Archives - Lokmarg

Bilkis’ Rapists Release Case: Justice Bela Recuses From Hearing

By LokMarg 13th December 2022

Justice Bela M Trivedi, Supreme Court judge, on Tuesday, recused herself from hearing the plea filed by Bilkis Bano, challenging the pre-mature release of 11 convicts, who had gang-raped her and murdered her family members during the 2002 Godhra riots.

A bench of Justices Ajay Rastogi and Bela M Trivedi said the matter be posted before another bench.
Besides filing a petition against the per-mature release of convicts, Bano has also filed a review petition seeking its earlier order by which it had asked the Gujarat government to consider the plea for the remission of one of the convicts.

The review petition was also listed for hearing today before Justice Rastogi in his camber.

As per procedures, review pleas against top court judgments are decided in chambers by circulation by the judges who were part of the judgment under review.

She has filed a review plea against the May order of the Supreme Court which allowed the Gujarat government to apply the 1992 remission Rules.

Bilkis said that even being the victim of the crime, she had no clue about any such process of remission or premature release initiated.

Gujarat’s remission order is a mechanical order of remission by completely ignoring the law requirement as consistently laid down, the plea said.

Earlier, some PILs were filed seeking directions to revoke the remission granted to 11 convicts.

The pleas were filed by the National Federation of Indian Women, whose General Secretary is Annie Raja, Member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) Subhashini Ali, journalist Revati Laul, social activist and professor Roop Rekha Verma, and TMC MP Mahua Moitra.

Gujarat government in its affidavit had defended remission granted to convicts saying they completed 14 years of sentence in prison and their “behaviour was found to be good”.

The State government said it has considered the cases of all 11 convicts as per the policy of 1992 and remission was granted on August 10, 2022, and the Central government also approved the ore-mature release of convicts.

It is pertinent to note that the remission was not granted under the circular governing grant of remission to prisoners as part of the celebration of “Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav”, it has said.

The affidavit stated, “State government considered all the opinions and decided to release 11 prisoners since they have completed 14 years and above in prisons and their behaviour was found to be good.”

The government had also questioned the locus standi of petitioners who filed the PIL challenging the decision saying they were outsiders to the case.

The pleas said they have challenged the order of competent authority of the government of Gujarat by way of which 11 persons who were accused in a set of heinous offenses committed in Gujarat were allowed to walk free on August 15, 2022, pursuant to remission being extended to them.

The remission in this heinous case would be entirely against public interest and would shock the collective public conscience, as also be entirely against the interests of the victim (whose family has publicly made statements worrying for her safety), pleas stated.

The Gujarat government released the 11 convicts, who were sentenced to life imprisonment, on August 15. All the 11 life-term convicts in the case were released as per the remission policy prevalent in Gujarat at the time of their conviction in 2008.

In March 2002 during the post-Godhra riots, Bano was allegedly gang-raped and left to die with 14 members of her family, including her three-year-old daughter. She was five months pregnant when rioters attacked her family in Vadodara. (ANI)

DCW Summons Twitter India, DP On Sharing Child Pornography, Rape Videos

By LokMarg 20th September 2022

The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has summoned Twitter India and Delhi Police officials over alleged videos of child pornography and rape being shared on the social media platform.

DCW took suo moto cognizance of several alleged tweets on the social media platform Twitter displaying child pornography.

“Videos of child pornography were shared on Twitter and were sold for Rs 20. Twitter is yet to delete them and report it further. We have summoned the head of Twitter India and have sought a report. We have also summoned Delhi Police and have sought immediate action,” DCW chief Swati Maliwal told ANI.

DCW said these tweets are openly depicting videos and photographs of sexual acts involving children.

In its letter to Twitter India and Delhi Police, the Commission said “Almost all the tweets are portraying children completely naked and many of them also depict brutal rape and other non-consensual sexual activities with children and women. Shockingly, some of these videos even depict rape with children and women while they are asleep!”

“Some of the twitter accounts engaging in these criminal acts appear to be running a racket wherein they seek money for providing pornographic and rape videos of children and women from other users of the social media platform,” said DCW.

The Commission claimed there appear to be hundreds of such objectionable videos on the social media platform which are openly displaying child pornography and rape videos of women and children.

DCW said it is deeply distressing that such illegal acts involving sexual abuse of children and young women are being publicized openly through the social media platform Twitter.

The Commission said it wishes to ascertain the steps being taken by Twitter to

prevent such “filthy and outrightly criminal acts” being propagated through its medium as well as the systems in place in the platform to immediately report the same to law enforcement agencies.

“Now therefore you are hereby summoned to appear before the Commission for the

purpose aforementioned on September 26. If you fail to comply with this order without lawful excuse, you will be subjected to the consequences of non-attendance as provided in law,” stated DCW. (ANI)

CM Chouhan Says Incident Of Sexual Assault On Nursery Student Is Faith Shaking

By LokMarg 15th September 2022

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Thursday termed the rape of a minor girl in Bhopal on a private school bus as “faith-shaking” and called for a meeting to give necessary directions in the matter.

“The misbehaviour with a daughter in a private school bus in Bhopal is a faith-shaking incident. Strict action should be taken against the guilty driver, female help, as well as the school management. “Necessary directions were given in the emergency meeting this morning,” CM Chouhan said in a tweet.
At the emergency meeting at 7 a.m. today, CM Chouhan said that it is the responsibility of the school management to maintain the trust with which the parents send their children to the school.

“It is the responsibility of the school to verify the staff who run school buses here. We cannot leave the children in the hands of predators,” he added.

He further emphasised the school’s responsibility to keep a check on the CCTV cameras and ensure why they are not functioning. The message that no action is taken against the influential people should not go to society, he said.

“There should be a strong belief that if there is a government, the criminals will not go away, strict action should be taken in the given time, so that the management also understands its responsibility, the Chief Minister added.

Chouhan directed that the drivers of all school buses in Bhopal should be tested and the ones with a record of the offence and a guilty persona should not be kept employed.

“Workshops regarding the training and legal provisions of its staff should be organized,” CM mentioned while adding that the training focused on awareness and information regarding the provisions of the Protection of Children Against Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act should also be organised for the parents as well as children in both the public and private schools.

The police should also communicate effectively with the parents and society on the subject, he added. (ANI)

6 Arrested People For Raping, Killing Two Dalit Sisters: Lakhimpur Kheri

By LokMarg 15th September 2022

A total of six persons have been arrested in the case of two Dalit minor sisters found hanging from a tree in Lakhimpur Kheri district of Uttar Pradesh, the district’s Superintendent of Police informed on Thursday.

“Total six accused involved in crime in different ways, arrested. Accused identified as Chotu, Junaid, Sohail, Hafizul, Karimuddin and Arif,” said Sanjeev Suman, Superintendent of Police, Lakhimpur Kheri.
According to the SP, the accused Junaid was nabbed in an encounter where he was shot in the leg.

The SP disclosed that the accused were friends with the deceased girls.

“The girls were yesterday lured to farms and raped by Sohail and Junaid. After the girls wanted the accused to marry them, Sohail, Hafizul, and Junaid strangulated and killed them. They then called Karimuddin and Arif and hanged the girls to eliminate any proof,” SP Sanjeev Suman said.

As per Suman, all the accused persons other than Chotu hailed from Lalpur village in Lakhimpur Kheri.

Chotu, who was a neighbour of the girls, had introduced the two girls to these boys and he too has been arrested, the SP added.

He further added that this was a preliminary probe and the post-mortem will start in about 2-3 hours.

“A panel of three doctors is conducting the post-mortem… the crime is against women and against a weaker section of society. We worked with speed and sensitivity. The accused have been booked under section 302, 376 of Indian Penal Code and the Protection Of Children from Sexual Offenses Act (POCSO) act,” he added.

On Wednesday evening, the bodies of two minor Dalit sisters were found hanging from a tree in Lalpur Majra Tamoli Purva village under the Nighasan police station of Lakhimpur Kheri district.

Local villagers and the girl’s family lodged a protest as they marched and blocked the road demanding justice for the victims.

The family of the deceased had accused three men of rape and murder and staged a demonstration at the Nighasan crossing, a few kilometers from the village.

Lakhimpur Kheri superintendent of police (SP) Sanjeev Suman, along with the police force, rushed to the protest site and assured villagers that strict action will be taken against the accused.

Lucknow range inspector general (IG) of police Laxmi Singh, while talking to ANI, had said, “Dead bodies of two girls were found hanging from a tree in a field outside a village in Lakhimpur Kheri. No injuries were found on the bodies.”

The police officials present there had also urged the villagers to call off their roadblock and cooperate with the post-mortem examination. (ANI)

‘Calling Delhi The Rape Capital Is Condoning The Rapists’

By LokMarg 7th February 2022

Madhuri Bhowmick, 30, an artiste based in New Delhi, says it will unfair to label the city as Rape Capital because it takes away the seriousness of a heinous crime

I am a trained classical dancer and owing to my profession I have to navigate many a late night in the city. I was born and brought up in Delhi and love the city. Every time a new rape case grabs the headlines, I, like most women, feel overwhelmed and angry. But I don’t give in to the fear. I mostly take an Uber (app-based taxi) during late nights and don’t compromise on my safety.

Yet, there is a 70:30 ratio conflict. Every time I go out, 70% of my thoughts tell me I will be safe and secure, owing to my own presence of mind and the security systems in place by the government. But 30% at the back of my mind, scary thoughts do run.

Having said that, I believe calling Delhi as the ‘rape capital’ of the world isn’t justified. Putting a label, any kind of label, on heinous crimes takes away the responsibility from the perpetrators of the crime. Delhi isn’t responsible for the rapes; it is the psychology of the individual who devalues another human being is the cause of concern. Each rape case is different; it is an individual who has been devalued and we should be careful about generalising it.

Delhi, in fact the whole of India, is seriously overpopulated. Crimes can flourish and go undetected amongst a sea of people. And it’s not as if other places in the world don’t have the problem of women being treated miserably; let’s talk about the issue that happened, rather than the place it happened in.

***Bhowmick often returns late from work in Delhi***

Post-Nirbhaya we thought the world would be a better place because of the outcry it generated. But even two years after the convicts were hanged, there has been no improvement. There is no fear of law, and the wheels of justice are overburdened and slow. And then there’s the issue of marital rape being discussed in the courts.

ALSO READ: ‘Marriage Is Not A Licence To Rape Spouse’

I believe that apart from legal changes, we need social changes or social sensitisation of the people. The huge nationwide drive for vaccination shows that it is possible to reach out to even the remotest corner of the country if we have the will. Perhaps rape or safety of women should be taken just as seriously as a pandemic.

Sex education should be made mandatory everywhere if we are to remove the problem right from its roots. Be it Delhi or anywhere, our parenting styles also need a change. In many households male-female friendships are frowned upon. We need to normalise male-female interactions. We as a society focus on IQ but we need to focus on Emotional intelligence too.

And lastly, I believe that like in every part of the world, lovely people reside in Delhi as well. So many news channels that can be used to spread social messages (including that of safety of women) indulge only in sensationalism; they are just trying to find material for their 24×7 news cycle. So, no, let’s not call Delhi the rape capital of the world, let’s not take away from the seriousness of the crime.

As Told To Yog Maya Singh