Congress leader to get back his Member of Parliament status
Team News Riveting
New Delhi, August 4
The Supreme Court on Friday stayed the conviction and two-year jail term imposed on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi by a Gujarat court in a criminal defamation case for his remark on Modi surname.
Former Gujarat minister Purnesh Modi had filed a criminal defamation case in 2019 against Gandhi over his “How come all thieves have Modi as the common surname” remark made during an election rally in Kolar in Karnataka on April 13, 2019. Gandhi had, in his speech linked Prime Minister Narendra Modi with fugitives like Nirav Modi and Lalit Modi. “Nirav Modi, Lalit Modi, Narendra Modi. How come all the thieves have ‘Modi’ as a common surname?” he had said.
The now disqualified parliamentarian was convicted by a court in Surat on March 23. The Wayanad Member of Parliament was disqualified after his conviction in the case. Gandhi appealed in the apex court challenging the Gujarat High Court verdict that dismissed his plea seeking a stay on his conviction in the defamation case.
A three-judge bench of Justices B R Gavai, P S Narasimha and P V Sanjay Kumar said that the trial court did not give any specific reasons for imposing the maximum punishment of two years’ imprisonment prescribed under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for the offence of defamation though the offence is a non-cognizable one. It noted that that the ramifications of the ruling (of conviction) are wide and affect the rights of electorate of Wayanad, the constituency which Gandhi was representing as a member of parliament (MP) in the Lok Sabha.
“We are of the considered view that the ramifications of the ruling are wide, and affect the rights of his constituency’s electorate. Considering the aforesaid and particularly that no reasons have been given by the trial judge for maximum sentence which has incurred disqualification, order of conviction needs to be stayed pendency of proceedings,” the top court ordered.
With this order, Gandhi’s membership to Lok Sabha from Wayanad would stand restored.
