SC to hear today Shashi Tharoor’s plea for quashing defamation case

As per the causelist published on the website of the apex court, a bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and R. Mahadevan will take up the matter for hearing.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court is slated to hear on Tuesday a plea filed by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor against the Delhi High Court’s refusal to quash a defamation case filed against him over his “scorpion sitting on a Shivling” remark made allegedly about Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

As per the causelist published on the website of the apex court, a bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and R. Mahadevan will take up the matter for hearing.

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On Monday, Tharoor’s plea was mentioned before the CJI D.Y. Chandrachud-led bench, when it was rising after hearing all the matters listed on board.

“He (Tharoor) moved the Delhi High Court for quashing but it was dismissed on 29th August. Immediately, within a week, a special leave petition was filed before the apex court,” said the counsel representing the senior Congress leader.

At this, CJI Chandrachud said, “Just circulate an email to the Registrar (Listing). I am going to attend all of them right now.”

On August 29, the Delhi High Court dismissed Tharoor’s plea for quashing the criminal defamation case filed by BJP leader Rajiv Babbar. Asking the parties to appear before the trial court on September 10, a bench of Justice Anoop Kumar Mendiratta of the high court vacated its earlier interim order, staying the proceedings pending before the lower court.

Babbar instituted the case against Tharoor over the latter’s ‘scorpion’ remark vis-a-vis PM Modi made in 2018 at the Bengaluru Literature Festival. In his complaint, Babbar alleged that his religious sentiments were hurt by Tharoor’s statement. The BJP leader claimed that the senior Congress leader completely disregarded the sentiments of crores of Shiva devotees by insulting their religious beliefs and filed a complaint under Sections 499 and 500 of the now-repealed Indian Penal Code (IPC).

After Tharoor was summoned by the trial court for allegedly committing an offence under Section 500 of the IPC, he moved the Delhi High Court contending that the summons order was “bad in law” and “against the principles of criminal jurisprudence”.

In his plea, Tharoor said that he did not make any false opinion or comments and rather only quoted a direct statement from an already published piece of journalistic work, adding that “a fair comment or honest opinion cannot be considered as defamation or libel”.

Issuing notice, the Delhi HC, in October 2020, ordered an interim stay on trial proceedings and sought the defendant’s reply to Tharoor’s plea for quashing the criminal defamation. Before this, a Delhi court imposed a fine of Rs 5,000 on Tharoor over his repeated non-appearance and strongly directed him to appear before it on the next date of hearing.