NEW DELHI: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi who was convicted for his alleged remarks on the ‘Modi’ surname has approached Supreme Court against Gujarat High Court’s refusal to stay his conviction.
Gandhi was convicted in the case and was sentenced to two years in jail by a Surat Court. The imprisonment had resulted in his disqualification as an MP under the Representation of People Act on March 24, 2023.
He had approached sessions court seeking a stay on his conviction but the same was rejected on April 20. His sentence was however suspended and he was granted bail on the same day to enable him to move appeal against the conviction within 30 days.
A bench of Justice Hemant M Prachchhak while upholding the Surat session’s court verdict on July 7 said that the need of the hour was to have “purity in politics” and had termed the two-year jail term as “just, proper and legal.” He had noted that stay on conviction is not the rule but an exception to be reserved for rare cases only and that the present case did not fall into that category.
Justice Prachchhak had noted that Modi surname holders and members of the Modi community were certainly identifiable and well-defined classes, and thus, the seriousness of Gandhi’s offence was compounded by the fact that the defamation alleged was of a large identifiable class, and not just an individual.
“The conviction of the petitioner involves the impairment of the cherished fundamental right to dignity and reputation of a large segment of the population.
The public standing of the petitioner and the fact that any utterance of the petitioner attracts large-scale publication gravely impairs and damages the reputation of the complainant and the identifiable class in question,” the high court’s order had said.
Declining to stay his conviction, the High Court noted that the leader had used PM Narendra Modi’s name in his speech at a poll rally to “add sensation” with an “intention to affect the result of the 2019 Lok Sabha election.”
The court had said that representatives of people should be men of clear antecedent. Additionally, the bench had also taken note of other complaints pending against Gandhi which also included the one filed by Vir Savarkar’s grandson in Pune court.
Notably, Purnesh Modi, the complainant who filed a defamation case against Gandhi for his alleged remarks on the ‘Modi’ surname had also filed a caveat in Supreme Court urging the top court to also hear him in case the Congress leader decides to appeal.
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