All the 11 men convicted in the Bilkis Bano gangrape case of 2002, who are currently out on remission, are under ‘police watch’ and are not missing, PTI reported on Friday, quoting a senior Gujarat Police officer.

“They have been under police watch ever since the SC gave its verdict (on January 8, quashing the remission granted by the Gujarat government),” Assistant Superintendent of Police, Limkheda division, Bishakha Jain said. “We contacted all of them on that day itself and it did not appear that they had any intention of going incommunicado after the verdict.”

On January 8, a bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan of the Supreme Court scrapped the remission granted to the 11 convicts in the case and directed them to surrender in two weeks.

The bench said Gujarat usurped the power of Maharashtra, where the original trial of the convicts happened, to grant remission, and nullified a 2022 judgment by another bench of the top court, which had directed Gujarat to consider the remission applications of the 11 convicts, saying it was obtained by “playing fraud” on court.

Some media reports thereafter had claimed that most of the convicts were missing and that their families were unaware of their whereabouts.

On Friday, Jain, however, refuted the claims and said that the convicts knew that they had to surrender and that they voluntarily came to the police station after the Supreme Court order on January 8, reported PTI.

“They knew that they had to surrender, and they voluntarily came to the police station after the SC order (of January 8) to inform us about their whereabouts. It is not true that they have gone missing,” said the IPS officer.

The convicts belong to Singvad and Randhikpur villages in Singvad taluka of Dahod. Days before the deadline to surrender, they petitioned the Supreme Court to seek more time to surrender, citing reasons such as meeting family responsibilities, caring for aged parents, harvesting winter crops and health conditions.

However, earlier today, the Supreme Court rejected the applications by the 11 convicts in the case seeking more time to surrender.

A bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan said that the court already gave them two weeks to surrender. “We gave you enough time to arrange your affairs. The reasons cited by the applicants for postponement of surrender and report back to jail have no merit as these reasons do not prevent them from complying with our direction of January 8,” it said.