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Political Notes

	January 28, 2008

Life term for 11 in Bilkis Bano case



A sessions court in Mumbai has sentenced 11 persons to life imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 2000 on each count in the Bilkis Bano case.



Five-month pregnant Bilkis and her family were set upon by two jeeploads of men from Randhikpur village in Dahod district during the Gujarat riots on March 3, 2002. Four women and four children were killed and six went missing. She was stripped and gang-raped.



Jaswant Nai, Govind Nai, Shailesh Bhatt, Radhyesham Bhagwan Das Shah, Bipin Chandra Joshi, Kesarbhai Vohania, Pradeep Mord¬hiya, Bakabhai Vohania, Rajubhai Soni, Mitesh Bhatt and Ramesh Chandana were held guilty of murder, gang-rape and rape of a pregnant woman. They were also sentenced to 10-year rigorous imprisonment for gang-rape and raping a pregnant woman. The sentences would run concurrently.



The charges against the accused included conspiracy, rioting with deadly weapons, causing disappearance of evidence and unlaw¬ful assembly.



Head Constable Somabhai Gori of the Limkheda police station was sentenced to three-year imprisonment for framing false records and refusing to lodge Bilkis Bano’s first complaint.



The judge ruled that the death penalty could only be given in the rarest of rare cases. In this case, the evidence was blank on the role of each accused.



The court observed that during riots many had secret agendas and they were not necessarily crusaders for their religion. Some looted, some plundered, some satisfied their lust and some joined a mob in killing.





Kidney racket busted



A Rs 100 crore kidney transplant racket that thrived on exploiting the poor and miserable with false promises and then removing their kidneys by force has been busted in Gurgaon, a few kilometres from the national capital.



The sheer scale of the racket - organized and brazen - that spanned six states and catered to the rich, including NRIs and foreigners, has left the authorities shaken.



About 600 kidneys may have been removed and transplanted, according to Moradabad police. It was one complaint in that town about a labourer being harassed for his kidney that blew the lid off this shocking operation. The police, with the help of their Gurgaon counterparts, conducted raids on two houses in the city to discover scheming doctors, terrified donors and recipients with deep pockets. The facilities enabling this scheme to work were state-of-the-art in both houses.



In what could be just be the tip of the iceberg, four doc¬tors and about five touts have so far been identified. But what’s shocking is that this racket has already been busted four times earlier, with Dr Amit Kumar, the mastermind who is now on the run, figuring in police files. Only one doctor, Dr Upender Kumar, has been caught.





Taslima’s visa extended



Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen, had her Indian visa extended for six months from February 17.



“I have come to know that my visa has been extended,” Taslima said on Wednesday, Jan. 23, when contacted in Delhi where she is stating at an undisclosed destination on security grounds.



“I am grateful to the Government of India for extending my visa. I consider India my own country,” Taslima said.



Radical Muslim groups have been demanding that Taslima’s visa not be extended and that she be asked to leave India.



She said she was tired of staying at the safe house and wanted to return to Kolkata.