Rahul Gandhi was recently convicted in a case of criminals defamation by Gujarat court after which he was disqualified from his parliamentarian constituence wayanad. This led to the opposition parties across the nation to come together and call it a black day for Indian democracy.
**RPA law about disqualification**
Section 8 of the RPA deals with disqualification for conviction of offences. The provision is aimed at “preventing criminalisation of politics” and keeping ‘tainted’ law makers from contesting elections. Disqualification is triggered for conviction under certain offences listed in Section 8(1). Section 8(1) includes certain specific offences such as promoting enmity between two groups, bribery and undue influence or personation at an election. Defamation does not fall under this list.Section 8(3) of the RPA mandates that an MP can be disqualified if convicted and sentenced to not less than two years of imprisonment.
What is the truth behind ?
This is about the 2019 election when Mr Gandhi was holding an election rally in Karnataka. There he gave a speech in which he questioned, “Why do all thieves have Modi in their names whether it is Nirav Modi, Lalit Modi or Narendra Modi? We don’t know how many more such Modis will come out.” It’s clear that he spoke about these 3 Modi’s. A case was filed against Rahul Gandhi under section **499** and **500** of the **Indian penal code .** The article deals with the defamation. Defamation in simple terms means, saying anything about any person that affects their reputation or damage to their reputation. Ipc section 500 deals with the punishment for defamation whoever defamed another shall be punished with the simple imprisonment for a term which may extend to two year or with both.
BJP MLA Purnesh Modi’s objection :
Former Gujarat minister Purnesh Modi claimed that Rahul Gandhi’s statement insulted the entire Modi community in the country. If we carefully examine Mr Gandhi’s speech and if I say that horn of cars causes noise pollution. Does this means that I am saying only source of pollution are the horn in cars? Obviously not. similarly if Mr Gandhi said that all thieves named Modi Does that mean he said all Modi’s are thieves ? As per my analysis he referred why are ***these** thieves named Modi .He didn’t said that every thief you find will be a Modi. Neither did he specifically mentioned about the modi community .He talked about the Demonetisation and GST and scam that were recently uncovered involving Lalit Modi, Nirav modi. He said PM was accused of the impact of Demonetisation .How the common man and small businesses had to suffer due to this and how the crony capitalist were benefited from this .There is a basic legal proposition if any statement refers a generic class of people . The defamation cannot stand unless an Individual can prove that
**Conclusion**
The definition given in section **499** of **IPC** clarifies this the imputation made about a person ,a deceased person ,a company or an association or collection of person as such has to be readily identifiable group of people. In these case Rahul Gandhi did not say anything about Purnesh Modi in particular.Senior advocate and former Congress leader kapil sibbal claims that the entire process and the outcomes has been bizarre and unprecedented. I agree with his opinion But I believe today defamation is l used as a weapon all over the world to suppress contradicting opinion. Take the example of Mr Gandhi this is not only the 1st case of defamation on him .There are other 8-9 ongoing defamation cases against him .This isn’t any specific political parties problem or Mr Gandhi problem.Throughout the country defamation is increasingly becoming a way of oppressive voice. 33 such defamation cases are filled against AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal. Congress leader Vivek Tamkha filed a ₹100 million suit against Madhya Pradesh CM Shivraj Singh Chauhan .In connection with the obc quota in panchayat polls . Even Indian supreme court had stated when a case filed by the Jayalalithaa government was being discussed. The Hon’ble supreme court stated defamation cases should not be used as a political weapon against the critics of government.
– Sanjana Dhakad
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