The Delhi High Court on Monday dismissed AAP leader Raghav Chadha’s plea that he cannot be made to face a criminal case only for retweeting Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s post against Union Minister Arun Jaitley in the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) row.
Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal, however, did not go into the question whether the retweets by Mr. Chadha would constitute an offence of defamation, saying the issue would have to be decided during trial. The court dismissed Mr. Chadha’s plea, saying it was “devoid of merit”.
Trial court summons
The case came to the High Court on the direction of the Supreme Court which had on September 15 asked it to decide by September 25, the AAP leader’s plea against the trial court’s summoning order.
Mr. Chadha in his plea had sought setting aside of a trial court order summoning him as an accused in the criminal defamation case filed by Mr. Jaitley against him and five other AAP leaders, including Mr. Kejriwal.
Apart from Mr. Chadha and Mr. Kejriwal, Kumar Vishwas, Ashutosh, Sanjay Singh and Deepak Bajpai are also accused in the criminal defamation case filed by the BJP leader.
Mr. Chadha had moved the apex court against the High Court’s July 11 order refusing to stay the lower court proceedings against him in the defamation matter.
In his plea, Mr. Chadha had raised the question before the High Court as to whether the trial court could have summoned him without determining if the alleged defamatory statements, which were purportedly made through Twitter, were covered under the penal provisions of defamation under the IPC.
Defamation suit
Mr. Kejriwal and other AAP leaders are facing a criminal defamation suit after they had alleged that Mr. Jaitley was involved in corrupt practices when he was the president of the DDCA, a post he had held from 2000 to 2013.
