Bilkis, who left fearing reprisal, hails order: 'Can breathe again'

"Today is truly the New Year for me.

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I have wept tears of relief. I have smiled for the first time in over a year and half. I have hugged my children. It feels like a stone the size of a mountain has been lifted from my chest, and I can breathe again, gang rape survivor Bilkis Bano wrote in a note on Monday issued by her advocate Shobha Gupta.

"This is what justice feels like. I thank the honourable Supreme Court of India for giving me, my children and women everywhere this vindication and hope in the promise of equal justice for all," Bano said.

Bano and her family, including her husband and four children, have relocated from Devgadh Baria, a tribal village where they were living for over a year now due to safety concerns, days before the Supreme Court on Monday quashed the early release of 11 men jailed for life for gang-raping her and murdering her seven relatives during the 2002 Gujarat riots.

After the brutality of the grisly 2002 gang rape and murder, Bilkis Bano first left her hometown of Randhikpur in Gujarat, moving from one city to another before settling down in the tribal hamlet of Devgadh. Barla, about 30km away. On Monday, as the nation's eyes turned towards the 43-year-old again after she succeeded in sending her rapists back to jail, Bano was gone again forced to leave her home in potential fear of the consequences of the fractious verdict.

As evening fell, however, and the Supreme Court's judgment scrapping the controversial remission granted to 11 men convicted of gang rape and murder made national headlines, Bano finally spoke up.