Punjab: Court issues summons to CM Bhagwant Mann, eight others for defamation

Manshahia has claimed that the Chief Minister, who was the MP of Sangrur at the time, had accused him of switching parties during 2019 Lok Sabha elections for Rs 10 crores and an assurance of getting the Chairman post of the Punjab Pollution Control Board by the Congress.

Bathinda: The Mansa Court on Friday issued summons to Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann along with eight others in a defamation case filed against them by former MLA Nazar Singh Manshahia. The court headed by chief judicial magistrate Atul Kamboj further ordered the summons to be returnable by July 21. Apart from Mann, four reporters and their editors have also been named in the suit for propagating false claims against the former AAP MLA back in 2019, when he left the Aam Aadmi Party and joined Congress.

Manshahia has claimed that the Chief Minister, who was the MP of Sangrur at the time, had accused him of switching parties during 2019 Lok Sabha elections for Rs 10 crores and an assurance of getting the Chairman post of the Punjab Pollution Control Board by the Congress. "My friends, relatives and sympathizers were deeply saddened by the false allegations leveled against me by Bhagwant Mann purely for political gains. I was also quoted in the newspapers, my image was tarnished. I had asked Mann to refute or apologize, to which I got no response. I therefore filed the defamation suit, in response to which the Hon'ble court had issued summons to Bhagwant Mann last year," the former AAP MLA said.

He said that Mann had been refusing to accept the summons, but during the last hearing, his counsel Gurdeep Singh Manshahia was present in the court and applied for Mann's exemption from appearing in the court. However, the apex court rejected the plea and directed the CM to appear before the court in person for the next hearing on July 21.