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Journalism of Courage
Registering its first case pertaining to the post-Godhra riots in Gujarat following a Supreme Court directive, the CBI has booked three persons and some other unknown people for allegedly gangraping the sisters of Bilkis Yakub Rasool and murdering her relatives. Cases have been registered against Jaswant Nai, Govind Nai and Naresh Moriya under several sections of the IPC for murder, rape and rioting on the complaint of Bilkis. The plight of Bilkis, herself gangraped while she was five months pregnant and fleeing rioters, was first reported in The Indian Express. She lost at least 13 relatives in the attack by a mob, including her three-year-old daughter, two sisters, her mother and two brothers.
The Gujarat police had closed her case despite a forensic report confirming rape, citing contradictions in her statement. On September 8, following Bilkis’s petition seeking a CBI probe, the Supreme Court had issued notices to the Gujarat government and its Home Department, and asked the state police to ‘‘keep off’’ her. Later, on December 16, it had directed the CBI to re-investigate the case and file a status report within eight weeks.
In an FIR lodged at the Limkheda police station in Gujarat on March 4, 2002, Bilkis had said that while she, her daughter, sisters and relatives were fleeing village Panivela after the riots in the last week of February 2002, they had been chased by a mob that had beaten them up and raped her and her sisters. Her daughter, sisters and other relatives had later been killed.
Bilkis is being represented by former solicitor general Harish Salve, who had taken up her case after refusing to represent the Narendra Modi government in Best Bakery.
