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.
The official said that further to identify other members of the drug syndicate, the officers laid a trap and apprehended the recipient of the said contraband drugs. The recipient came from Hyderabad to Mumbai to collect the drugs. This person was further supposed to deliver the drugs to an African person in Navi Mumbai.
In a statement here, the Chief Minister said the drug trade which had flourished during the previous Akali-BJP and the Congress regime had ruined the future generations of the state.
Troopers of Trishakti Corps of the Indian Army and BRO personnel under 'Project Swastik' swung into action immediately, and launched an all-out rescue mission. A total of 23 people, including six from a deep valley, have been pulled out alive. They have been shifted to the nearby medical facilities of the Indian Army.
While denying him bail, Judge Nagpal had said that Sisodia can, prima facie, be held to be the "architect of the criminal conspiracy". He observed that the payment of advance kickbacks of around Rs 90-100 crore was meant for him and his other colleagues in the AAP government.
During his campaign, Gandhi stated that "all thieves have Modi surname", equating Prime Minister Narendra Modi with fugitives like Lalit Modi and Nirav Modi. On March 23, a lower court in Surat found him guilty of defaming the entire Modi community in a case filed by BJP MLA Purnesh Modi.
A Delhi Police official said that one of the buyers was a liquor mafia group led by Sumit Anangpur from Faridabad, which purchased stolen luxury cars worth around Rs 20 lakh each, for just Rs 3-4 lakh and used them to hoodwink the agencies to transport foreign liquor to Bihar.
