In a continuing defamation case against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for allegedly disparaging late right-wing leader Vinayak Savarkar, a Pune court on Tuesday ordered Gandhi to appear before it in person on December 2. VD Savarkar’s grandson Satyaki Savarkar has filed the complaint.
According to LiveLaw, the Pune special court has requested Gandhi’s physical attendance at the upcoming hearing of the defamation case against him for allegedly disparaging the late right-wing leader Vinayak Savarkar in a speech he gave in the UK.
Rahul Gandhi was summoned by Judge Amol Shinde of the special MP/MLA court in October to personally appear in court and respond to the accusations made against him.
According to the report, the counsel appearing for Savarkar informed the Pune court that Gandhi’s office had received the summons, and yet the Congress leader chose not to appear before the court.
Gandhi’s counsel Milind Pawar, informed the special court that his client is a Member of Parliament (MP) from Rae Bareli, Uttar Pradesh and also a Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha. He further said that Gandhi has been busy travelling across the country as several States have been undergoing elections in the past two month and being an LoP and leader of a national party, Gandhi has been busy travelling to various parts of the country for election campaigns, the report said.
On the next hearing date, however, Rahu Gandhi’s attorney will make an in-person appearance, the court was informed.
The court noted the submissions and postponed the case until December 2. But at the following hearing, the court ordered Gandhi to physically appear before it.
The defamation complainant alleges that Gandhi made intentionally wild allegations against Savarkar, knowing them to be untrue, with the intention of harming Savarkar’s reputation and causing mental agaony to family. The complaint has cited news reports and a YouTube link to a video of Gandhi’s speech in London as evidence.
The complaint states that Gandhi falsely accused Savarkar of writing a book in which he described beating up a Muslim person, which Savarkar never wrote and such an incident never happened, the report said.
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Source: ABP News
