Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Wednesday filed a petition in the Madhya Pradesh High Court, expressing regret for his alleged defamatory statement about Kartikeya Singh Chauhan, son of Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan. Karthikeya had filed a defamation complaint against the Congress leader's statement. Hearing in this matter is to be held today in the Jabalpur bench of the High Court.
Kartikeya Singh, son of former Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, had filed a defamation complaint against Gandhi, the leader of opposition in the Lok Sabha, in a Bhopal court. In the application filed by Rahul Gandhi's lawyer, it has been said that his statement was not about Kartikeya Singh.
Karthikeya had filed a defamation complaint against Rahul Gandhi in the special court of Bhopal set up for the cases of MPs and MLAs. He alleges that during an election rally in Jhabua in 2018, a Congress leader had taken his name while referring to the Panama Papers leak case, which damaged his reputation.
While hearing the case, the court had issued summons to Rahul Gandhi to appear in person, after which the Congress leader approached the Jabalpur bench of the High Court demanding quashing of the summons and defamation case. High Court Justice Pramod Kumar Aggarwal will hear Rahul Gandhi's petition on Thursday.
Petitioner Karthikeya on Wednesday presented the records of the lower court as per the instructions of the High Court. Advocate Sankalp Kochhar appeared on behalf of the complainant in the High Court.
In his application filed in the High Court, Rahul said that his comments were not against the complainant. He said that Karthikeya's name had come up by mistake during the speech. However, the very next day of this statement, Rahul had publicly clarified that he was referring to Abhishek Singh, son of the then Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh Raman Singh, but due to confusion, the name of Kartikey Singh Chouhan was mistakenly taken.
During the election rally in Jhabua, Rahul had alleged that the name of Shivraj Singh's son Kartikeya Singh has come up in the Panama Papers leak case. When former Prime Minister of Pakistan Nawaz Sharif's name appeared in the Panama Papers, he was sent to jail there, whereas no action was taken in the same case in Madhya Pradesh.
