Mahua moitra writes our bilkis moment

Mahua moitra writes our bilkis moment

The visuals of Bilkis Bano’s rapists and the murderers of her family being garlanded are fresh for all to see. The Union government’s silence is deafening. This nation is being drip fed via the BJP’s insidious propaganda system that the state of Gujarat had nothing to do with the release of these 11 convicted men, now being celebrated as heroes, as Bilkis’s husband painfully puts it, and that it acted on the Supreme Court’s direction. In fact, the court only noted the applicable remission policy, which allows for remission of the sentences of convicts who have spent 14 years in jail. It did not compel the release of the convicts. The decision to free the rapists and killers — instead of letting them remain in jail, as the policy allows — was entirely that of the government.

For those of us who deal with the BJP’s Goebbelsian doublespeak on a daily basis, this should come as no surprise. And yet, this time feels different. The stark facts of a young pregnant woman being gang-raped in front of her mother, then forced to watch the rape of her mother and her two sisters. Then made to watch her three-year-old’s head smashed. Make no mistake — these facts were proven in court and the “sanskari Brahmins” found guilty. This is no case of innocent till proven guilty, no case of undertrials being given the benefit of doubt. These 11 were proven guilty and sentenced to life in prison for the most heinous crimes of gang-rape and murder. No one, not even the most ardent Sanghi, can dispute this inalienable fact.

How, then, in a country where average pendencies are upwards of 14 years, where undertrials serve years in prison without being charge-sheeted, where convicts with crimes far less heinous than that of the 11 in the Bilkis Bano case serve 30-40 years of life terms without being considered for remission, did these men walk free?

The answer, simply, lies in method.