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Supreme Court: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi got a big relief from the Supreme Court on Thursday. The court has extended the stay on the lower court proceedings against Rahul Gandhi.
Supreme Court: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi got a big relief from the Supreme Court on Thursday. The court has extended the stay on the lower court proceedings against Rahul Gandhi. The Supreme Court extended its interim order staying proceedings against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in a case related to his derogatory remarks against the Indian Army during the 2022 Bharat Jodo visit till April 22 next year. A bench of Justices MM Sundaresh and Satish Chandra Sharma accepted the appeal filed by Gandhi and said it would hear the case in detail. The bench was hearing Rahul Gandhi’s plea challenging the Allahabad High Court’s May 29 order, which had rejected his plea challenging the trial court’s summoning order in the Indian Army remarks case.
Objection to giving statement without any evidence
While hearing Gandhi’s petition on August 4, the apex court had stayed further proceedings in the case pending in a Lucknow court till the next date of hearing. The bench had earlier asked Gandhi about his alleged comment that how did you know that 2,000 square kilometers of Indian territory has been occupied by the Chinese? Were you there? Do you have any reliable material? The bench further said that why are you giving this statement without any evidence? If you are a true Indian, you will not say anything like this. The top court had then issued a notice to the Uttar Pradesh government and the complainant in the case, seeking their response to Gandhi’s petition. Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for Gandhi, had told the apex court that it would be an unfortunate situation if the opposition leaders could not raise issues.
Case during Bharat Jodo Yatra
He cited Section 223 of the Indian Civil Defense Code and said that prior hearing of the accused is mandatory before the court takes cognizance of a criminal complaint, which was not done in the present case. In his petition filed in the court, complainant Uday Shankar Srivastava alleged that Gandhi made several derogatory comments against the Indian Army in the context of clashes with Chinese troops during his visit in December 2022. The trial court summoned Gandhi as an accused to face trial for the alleged offense of defamation. Gandhi’s lawyer Pranshu Aggarwal argued that just by reading the complaint the allegations appear to be fabricated. It was also argued that Gandhi was not a resident of Lucknow. Therefore, the trial court should have examined the veracity of the allegations before calling them on this complaint, and should have called them only when the allegations were found prima facie suitable for trial.
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