Ahmedabad: The Gujarat High Court will deliver its verdict on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's plea seeking a stay on his conviction in a criminal defamation case over his Modi surname remark, on Friday. If the plea was allowed, the Congress leader might be reinstated as Member of Parliament and will be able to attend the Monsoon session of the Parliament scheduled later this month.
The Thursday causelist from the HC stated that the court of Justice Hemant Prachchhak will deliver the verdict at 11am. It is pertinent to note that the judge had earlier refused to grant any interim relief while hearing Gandhi's plea. The judge said the court will pass its final order after the summer vacation. The court resumed its session by mid-June after vacation.
A maximum punishment of two years for a bailable, non-cognisable offence meant his client could lose his Lok Sabha seat "permanently and irreversibly", which was a "very serious additional irreversible consequence to the person and the constituency he represents," PTI reported Rahul Gandhi's lawyer as arguing.
On March 23, a metropolitan magistrate's court in Surat sentenced the former Congress chief two years prison term while convicting him under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 499 and 500 (criminal defamation) in a 2019 case filed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Purnesh Modi.
As a fallout of the verdict, Rahul Gandhi who was elected to the Lok Sabha from Wayanad in Kerala, was disqualified as MP under the provisions of the Representation of the People Act, by the Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla. Earlier, Rahul Gandhi challenged the order in a sessions court in Surat. His application seeking a stay on the conviction in the sessions court was rejected. The sessions court, however, granted him bail on April 20. The present appeal at the High Court was preferred after sessions court ruling.
Purnesh Modi who is representing Surat West had filed a criminal defamation case against Rahul Gandhi after the latter wondered "how come all thieves have Modi as the common surname?" Rahul's remark came at an election rally at Kolar in Karnataka on April 13, 2019.
