A court in Maharashtra’s Thane district on Saturday granted relief to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. The court granted permanent exemption from appearance in the defamation case filed against Rahul Gandhi by a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) functionary. Bhiwandi First Class Judicial Magistrate C Wadikar heard Gandhi’s application filed through Rahul Gandhi’s lawyer Narayan Iyer and said the Congress leader was entitled to permanent immunity.
The magistrate fixed June 3 for recording of evidence in the defamation suit filed by local RSS worker Rajesh Kunte. Kunte had filed a private complaint before the Bhiwandi magistrate’s court in 2014 after watching Gandhi’s speech in which Rahul Gandhi allegedly accused the RSS of killing Mahatma Gandhi. Kunte claimed that the reputation of the RSS was hurt by the statement.
Rahul Gandhi had appeared before the court in June 2018 and had declared himself innocent. The court in its order said that the accused Rahul Gandhi is exempted from appearance in the court till further orders passed by the court subject to the following conditions. In the first condition, the accused undertakes that his duly nominated advocate shall from time to time and regularly appear before the court on every appointed date and conduct the case in the absence of the accused. The second condition states, the accused will have to appear in the court on receiving instructions.
It may be noted that Rahul Gandhi was recently disqualified as an MP after being convicted by a Surat court in a defamation case. He had last year sought exemption from appearance in the Bhiwandi court on the grounds that he lives in Delhi and, as a Lok Sabha member, has to visit his constituency Wayanad, attend party work and travel a lot. Therefore, personal appearance in this matter be exempted. Gandhi had requested that he be allowed to be represented by his lawyer in the hearing as and when required. Kunte had recently argued that since Gandhi is no longer a parliamentarian, he should not be given immunity in this matter.