Modi surname case: Gujarat High Court refuses interim protection to Rahul Gandhi, verdict after summer break

Ahmedabad: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s gruelling wait for freedom from the Surat criminal defamation case over ‘Modi surname’ was stretched at least by a month on Tuesday after the Gujarat High Court reserved its orders until the month-long summer break. 

The court’s summer vacation is from May 5 to June 4 and so it will pass the final judgment after that. 

BJP lawyer: If you do not want to apologize, it is your right but do not cry in the courtroom like a cry- baby

After the lower courts rejected his applications for a stay on his conviction in the case, Gandhi had knocked the doors of the high court with a criminal revision plea. 

Not only did the single judge bench of Justice Hemant Prachchhak reserved his order on Gandhi’s plea but also refused to grant any interim protection to him. 

Refusing any interim protection to Gandhi at this stage, the high court held that, “It is in the interest and fitness of the case that the matter be decided finally.”

Advocate Nirupam Nanavati, who appeared for Gujarat Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Purnesh Modi, the original complainant in the case, also opposed the prayer for interim relief from Gandhi’s counsel Abhishek Manu Singhvi.

Beginning his arguments, Nanavati alleged that Gandhi was adopting double standards. He drew the court’s attention to newspaper clippings quoting RahulGandhi that he would continue to speak and the conviction was a gift. 

Nanavati asserted, “If you are a motormouth, you speak. If you do not want to apologize, it is your right but do not cry in the courtroom like a cry- baby”. He also read out a remark by the Congress leader after his conviction, “My name is Gandhi not Savarkar and I won’t apologize.”

The lawyer went on to say that if Gandhi was a “motormouth” and was facing 12 similar cases, then he should not say that he was wrongly convicted. 

Modi surname case

Gandhi, who represented Kerala's Wayanad in Lok Sabha, was disqualified as MP after the lower court convicted him and awarded a two-year jail term.

Gandhi’s counsel Singhvi asked what if the Election Commission declared a by-election in Wayanad. The Election Commission, he said, “isn’t bothered that the case is being heard in the high court.” 

Singhvi reiterated that for an MP, the disqualification is a matter of big significance. He said the speeches made during election campaigns should be treated with greater latitude.