Rahul Gandhi moves Gujarat HC for stay on defamation conviction
Darpan News Desk IANS, 25 Apr, 2023 04:03 PM
Ahmedabad, April 25 (IANS) Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday filed an appeal in the Gujarat High Court, seeking a stay on his conviction by a magistrate's court in a criminal defamation case.
The appeal will be heard by a single-judge bench in due course. On April 20, a sessions court in Surat dismissed Gandhi's plea for the suspension of his conviction.
Gandhi, now disqualified as a parliamentarian, was convicted by a magistrate's court on March 23 for his controversial remark, "All thieves have Modi surname," made during a political campaign in Karnataka's Kolar in 2019. Former BJP MLA Purnesh Modi claimed that Gandhi's statement humiliated and defamed persons with the Modi surname.
The magistrate court accepted Modi's contention that Gandhi intentionally insulted people with the 'Modi' surname. The sessions judge refused to stay the conviction, leading to Gandhi's present plea before the High Court.
On Wednesday, The Prime Minister's rally in Ferozepur had to be cancelled due to a security lapse after some protesters blocked a route and forced his convoy to spend about 20 minutes on a flyover. The Prime Minister was enroute the National Martyrs Memorial at Hussainiwala when the incident happened.
Although the department has all infrastructural needs in place to deal with the large number of cases expected in case of the third wave becoming a reality, he also appealed to the people to get themselves fully vaccinated against the virus as it is the most potent tool to avoid Covid-19.
Regretting that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had to cancel his scheduled visit to Ferozepur midway, Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi said on Wednesday that there was no security lapse that led to the cancellation of the Prime Ministers visit to the bordering town.
Holding the Punjab government squarely responsible for the "gross security lapse" during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Punjab, that eventually led to cancellation of all his programmes, former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Wednesday demanded dismissal of the government and imposition of President's rule.
With the spike in Covid-19 cases, Punjab on Tuesday imposed statewide night curfew daily from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. and ordered closure of all educational institutions till January 15.
The accused, identified as Ashish Kumar, tied his wife Ranjan Devi and son Vaibhav to the bed and set them on fire at his house in Mayurwa locality, which comes under the Triveniganj police station.
