Supreme Court: The Division Bench of BR Gavai and Prashant Kumar Mishra, while hearing Rahul Gandhi’s plea against Gujarat High Court’s order wherein his revision petition to stay the conviction order in Modi Surname defamation case was dismissed, issued Notice and listed the matter for hearing on 04-08-2023.
Background
A private complaint was filed against Rahul Gandhi, wherein it was alleged that he gave a speech at Kolar Near Bengaluru and addressed the Prime Minister as a thief and compared him with several economic offenders of India like Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi, Lalit Modi and Vijay Malya. It was also alleged that Gandhi had also asked that why all thieves have the surname Modi and defamed the Prime Minister by saying that in Rafale deal the Prime Minister is 100 percent thief and not chowkidar. The Chief Judicial Magistrate (‘CJM’) had found Rahul Gandhi guilty of the offence punishable under Sections 499 and 500 of the Penal Code, 1860 (‘IPC’) and sentenced him to undergo simple imprisonment of two years. Being aggrieved with the said order of the CJM, he had preferred an appeal before the District and Sessions Court, Surat. However, the said appeal was dismissed vide impugned order dated 20-04-2023.
Aggrieved by the conviction order, a revision petition was preferred before the Gujarat High Court to set aside the order of conviction and stay the order passed by the CJM. The Gujarat High Court said that there was no reasonable ground to stay Rahul Gandhi’s conviction and dismissed the criminal revision petition.
Source: Press
Also Read: Gujarat HC rejects Rahul Gandhi’s plea to stay Conviction in Modi Surname Defamation Case
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