India
oi-Prakash KL
Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi has been acquitted in a criminal defamation case linked to his 2018 remarks about Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
The verdict was delivered by Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Shubham Verma in Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh, on Monday. Gandhi was present in court when the judgment was pronounced.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was acquitted on Monday in Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh, in a criminal defamation case filed by BJP leader Vinay Mishra concerning his 2018 remarks about Union Home Minister Amit Shah. The court ruled that Gandhi’s statements did not amount to defamation.
The court held that Gandhi’s remarks against Shah did not amount to defamation.
The case was filed in 2018 by BJP leader Vinay Mishra under Sections 499 and 500 of the Indian Penal Code. Mishra had objected to comments made by Gandhi during the Karnataka Assembly election campaign that year.
Addressing a gathering in Bengaluru, Gandhi had referred to Shah as a person accused in a murder case while questioning the BJP’s claims of honesty and propriety.
“People in India forget that the president of BJP is a murder accused. That’s the truth. The party that talks about honesty, decency, has a person who has been accused of murder as president,” Live Law quoted the Congress leader had allegedly said at the rally.
The remarks were in connection with the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case. Shah had been named as an accused in the case but was discharged by a special CBI court in 2014.
Mishra subsequently approached the court, alleging that Gandhi’s statement was defamatory. The proceedings continued for several years before the Sultanpur court delivered its verdict on Monday.
“I was the vice president of BJP when this incident happened…When I heard these allegations, I felt very pained because I am a 33-year-old worker of the party. I filed a complaint regarding this through my lawyer and this continued for almost five years,” ANI quoted Vijay Mishra as telling on November 28, 2023.
Rahul Gandhi’s Other Defamation Case
The Sultanpur case is separate from the defamation case over Gandhi’s 2019 “Modi surname” remark.
In that case, a Gujarat court in 2023 sentenced Gandhi to two years in prison after finding him guilty over his comments at an election rally in Kolar, Karnataka. Gandhi had questioned why people with the surname Modi included fugitives such as Nirav Modi and Lalit Modi.
Following the conviction, Gandhi lost his Lok Sabha membership as per the provisions applicable to a lawmaker convicted and sentenced to imprisonment.
The Supreme Court later stayed the conviction, allowing Gandhi to retain his membership of Parliament.
