Ahmedabad, April 29
The offence for which Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was awarded the maximum sentence of two years in jail was not serious nor did it involve any “moral turpitude”, his lawyer told the Gujarat High Court on Saturday while seeking a stay to his conviction in the 2019 defamation case.
If a bypoll was conducted for the Wayanad constituency which Gandhi represented before he was disqualified, its result cannot be undone even if the Congress leader won his appeal against the conviction, said his lawyer Abhishek Singhvi.
After hearing Singhvi’s arguments, the HC adjourned the hearing to May 2 as advocate Nirupam Nanavati, the lawyer of complainant and Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Purnesh Modi, sought time to file a reply.
Justice Hemant Prachchhak of the High Court on Saturday began hearing Gandhi’s revision application against the Surat sessions court April 20 order declining a stay to his conviction for criminal defamation over his ‘why all thieves have the Modi surname’ remark.
If Gandhi obtains a stay, it would pave the way for his reinstatement as a Lok Sabha MP.
“There are very serious ex-facie vitiating factors of the trial that raise grave apprehension about the process of trial,” advocate Singhvi argued, pointing out that the maximum sentence was awarded for a bailable, non-cognisable offence.
“In the case of a public servant or a legislator, it has very serious additional irreversible consequences – to the person, the constituency, and also drastic consequences of re-election,” he told the court.
If the Election Commission notified a bypoll for Wayanad seat and someone else got elected, then the situation becomes irreversible as this person cannot be unseated even if Gandhi wins his appeal, he said.
If this situation “is not enough to suspend conviction, then what additional circumstances can anybody have?” Singhvi asked.
He also questioned why complainant Purnesh Modi did not challenge Gandhi’s application in the sessions court for a stay to the sentence, but challenged his plea for a stay to the conviction.
He questioned Modi’s “possible interest in Gandhi’s disqualification.” Gandhi was disqualified under the Representation of the People Act on March 24, a day after the Surat magistrate’s court convicted and sentenced him to two years’ imprisonment for criminal defamation.
Gandhi had not named Purnesh Modi in his speech at the election rally at Kolar in Karnataka on April 13, 2019, where he made the remark in question, Singhvi said.
Under section 499 of the Indian Penal Code (which deals with the offence of defamation), the complainant must be an aggrieved person which was not the case here, he argued.
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