Delhi gangrape documentary: Permission to interview rapist given by Home Ministry
New Delhi: With a documentary on 16 December, 2012 gangrape creating a storm, an internal inquiry of the Home Ministry has found that permission for taking the interview by a British filmmaker of a rape convict was granted by the ministry in July 2013, which lawyers consider "contravention" of jail manuals.
While granting the permission, the Home Ministry put the conditions that the rapist has to give his consent for the interview and the Tihar jail authorities will watch the raw footage of the film and give its consent before its telecast.
Read: Delhi gangrape: Lawyers too speak convict Mukesh Singh's voice
Sources said even though rape convict Mukesh Singh gave his consent for the interview, the Tihar jail officials apparently did not go through the raw footage of the documentary which is said to be 16-hour long. Besides, there were correspondence between film-maker Leslee Udwin and the Home Ministry in February 2014 when it was informed that the documentary had been sold to BBC.
Udwin was said to have conveyed that the raw footage of the documentary was with her and anyone from the Tihar jail or Home Ministry could watch it.
Read: Delhi Police to move court for restraining order against 'Nirbhaya' accused's interview
However, sources said, there was no initiative on the part of either the Home Ministry or the Tihar jail to watch the documentary.
Delhi High Court lawyer MS Khan said that the jail manual permits and regulates the meetings of prisoners with outsiders but it does not allow a personal video interview of an inmate.
"Personal interview of an inmate is in contravention of jail manual," he said.
Read: Nirbhaya rapist interview row: Rajnath Singh intervenes, seeks report from Tihar jail
In the interview, Mukesh said the women who went out at night had only themselves to blame if they attracted the attention of gangs of male molesters.
"A girl is far more responsible for rape than a boy," he had said.
Mukesh also said that had the girl and her friend not tried to fight back, the gang would not have inflicted the savage beating, which led to her death later.
