Bilkis Bano case: Previous SC order obtained through 'fraud on court', says apex court

'In our view, the said order was obtained by fraud played on this Court and hence, is a nullity and non est in law,' the bench said.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday declared its 2022 judgment allowing the Gujarat government to decide remission plea of one of the 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano case as “nullity” and “non est in the eyes of law” for having been obtained through “fraudulent” means.

Radheshyam Bhagwandas Shah, one of the accused in the case, had filed a writ petition in the apex court.

In 2022, the apex court allowed Shah to approach the Gujarat government for remission, which formed the basis for the premature release of all the convicts in the case.

In its latest judgment, the bench pointed out Shah did not inform the apex court that the Gujarat High Court had dismissed his writ petition.

In 2019, he had filed an application before the Gujarat High Court challenging the non-consideration of his application for premature release. The high court observed that since Shah had been tried in Maharashtra, the State of Maharashtra should be the ‘appropriate government’ to consider the remission.

“We may point out that if Shah had felt aggrieved by the order of the Gujarat High Court in 2019, it was open to him to challenge the said order before this court, but he did not do so. Rather, he complied with the order of the Gujarat High Court by filing a remission application before the Government of Maharashtra,” the bench said.

After various authorities gave negative opinion on his application before the Maharashtra government, Shah moved the SC seeking a direction to Gujarat to consider his remission application suppressing the material facts.

Contrary to the judgments of the apex court, a writ of mandamus was issued to Gujarat government to consider the plea for premature release in terms of its policy of 1992, the bench said. “It was not brought to the notice of this court by any party that the said policy had been cancelled and had been substituted by another policy in 2014,” the court added.

The bench also pointed out that realising that the 11 convicts would not be released under the remission policy of 2014, which had substituted the earlier policy of 1992, the writ petition was filed by Shah before the apex court seeking a specific direction to Gujarat to consider his case as per the policy of 1992. “This he could not have done, thereby misrepresenting and suppressing relevant facts, thus playing fraud on this court,” it said.