NEW DELHI, 7 August 2004 — The Supreme Court yesterday ordered the trial of a Gujarat riots case transferred from the state to Maharashtra.
Bilquise Yakub Rasul has said that as witnesses are being threatened and with the police hand in glove with the accused, a fair trial is not possible in Gujarat. The Central Bureau of Investigation has said it does not have any objection to the case being transferred. The CBI is also apprehensive that witnesses could come to harm if the trial were held in Gujarat. The Bilquise case is the second that has been transferred to Maharashtra by the Supreme Court. On April 12, the court directed that the trial of the Best Bakery case be shifted to Bombay.
During the post-Godhra riots in Gujarat, Bilquise was gang raped and 14 of her family members were killed near Panivela village in Dahod district. The CBI later arrested six police officers and charged them with disposing of bodies. While transferring the case, the Supreme Court said that it was not a reflection on the judiciary of the state as the case was being transferred in view of the apprehensions voiced by the victim and the investigating agency.
The three-judge bench requested the chief justice of the Bombay High Court to assign the case to an appropriate court. Lest any controversy should arise over the appointment of a public prosecutor in the case, as has happened in the Best Bakery case pending before a Bombay court, the Supreme Court directed the CBI to appoint a public prosecutor in the Bilquise case.
