CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Monday directed the VIII Metropolitan Magistrate to dispense with the appearance of superstar Rajinikanth except on the dates when the hearings are to be ordered by the Magistrate. The court pronounced the order in the defamation case that was filed against Rajinikanth for his alleged statement that film financier S Mukanchand Bothra of Sowcarpet was attempting to extort money from him.
The Magistrate dismissed the petition on April 12, 2017, as Bothra did not appear before him on the hearing dates. Hence, the present revision petition was filed by Bothra. Allowing the petition, Justice MV Muralidharan said it was his absolute view that the Magistrate has not followed the procedure as per Section 203 of Cr.P.C. The judge said that since the Magistrate recorded the sworn statement on September 21, 2015, he should take further course of action by directing Bothra to produce the witnesses and thereafter should have passed appropriate orders about the complaint either to take cognizance or reject it.
The judge in his order said if the Magistrate is taking cognizance of the complaint and issue summons to Rajinikanth, his appearance is dispensed with, except on the hearings to be ordered by the Magistrate.
The Judge directed VIII Metropolitan Magistrate, George Town, to follow the procedure under Section 203 of Cr.P.C. and thereafter to pass appropriate orders in the unnumbered criminal complaint filed by the financier in 2015 and further directed that the said exercise shall be done within a period of eight weeks from the date of receipt of a copy of the order. The Judge also ordered Bothra to give his fullest co-operation for early orders to be passed by the Magistrate within a period stipulated by the High Court.
Get Prez nod for making Tamil official language of HC: Vaiko
Chennai: MDMK general secretary Vaiko on Monday urged the Tamil Nadu government to take steps to obtain the Presidential nod for making Tamil the official language of the Madras High Court, a demand that has been pending for long. Pointing out that Hindi has been made official language of the High Courts in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, he rued that injustice was being done to Tamil Nadu in this regard. He noted that Section 348 (2) provides for making the local languages of the states the official language of High Courts.
Petition to recover losses from transport employees dismissed
Chennai: The HC dismissed a petition that sought the government to recover the loss incurred by the State due to the bus strike from the employees. In their PIL, two residents of Chennai sought a direction to the Tamil Nadu government to recover the loss incurred by the state due to the bus strike from the striking employees. “The workers have withdrawn their strike after HC interfered. But the government has now passed the burden of heeding their demand on to people by increasing the bus,” petitioners said. The First Bench rejected submissions of advocate Puhal Gandhi and others.