Union Minister Kiren Rijiju lashed out at former Supreme Court judge over the latter’s comments on freedom of expression in India. The retired official had asserted during a recent interview to discuss the Bilkis Bano case that “things are very bad” in the country at present. He had also referred to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to underscore his point.
“Those people who speak all the time without any restrictions to abuse the popularly elected Prime Minister are crying about freedom of expression! They will never talk about emergency imposed by Congress party and never dare to criticise some regional party Chief Ministers,” he tweeted in response to the newspaper snippet.
In a follow-up post the Union Minister added that he did not know if a former judge of the Supreme Court had actually said this. “If it’s true then the statement itself is demeaning the institution he has served,” he concluded
Speaking to The Hindu earlier this week, retired justice BN Srikrishna had opined that he might be ‘raided, arrested or thrown into jail without a reason being given’ if he were to “stand in a public square and say I don’t like the face of the Prime Minister”.
The remarks have since gone viral, with many on social media platforms pulling the quote out of the far longer interaction to hit out at the government.
The 11 men sentenced to life imprisonment in connection with the gang rape of Bilkis Bano during the 2002 Gujarat communal riots and the murder of seven members of her family walked out of the Godhra sub-jail on August 15 after the Gujarat government allowed their release under its remission policy. They had served more than 15 years in jail.
The Supreme Court had directed the Gujarat government to look into the issue of remission of the sentence of one of the convicts.
