Defamation case: SC gives BJP leader six weeks to reply on Atishi, Arvind Kejriwal plea

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday granted six weeks to a Delhi BJP leader to respond to a plea of Delhi Chief Minister Atishi and AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal against an order that refused to quash a defamation case against them over their alleged remarks on deletion of the voters' names.

A bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and S V N Bhatti adjourned the hearing after the counsel for complainant Rajiv Babbar sought more time to file his response.

On September 30, last year, the apex court while issuing notice to Babbar stayed the proceedings before the trial court.

Babbar said he did not file the complaint in an individual capacity but as the authorised representative of the BJP, a political party, while bringing on record a January 16, 2019 authorisation letter in support of his claim.

Previously, senior advocate Sonia Mathur, representing Babbar, submitted the alleged statements were defamatory in nature as they lowered the party's credibility amongst voters.

On the other hand, senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for Atishi and Kejriwal, submitted nowhere in the complaint Babbar projected how his reputation was lowered in the estimation of others.

Singhvi argued the statements in question were made a few months before Parliamentary elections and those ought to be taken as a part of the political discourse by the respective political parties fighting elections.

The top court said the legal question was whether the complainant or a political party would be covered under the definition of "aggrieved persons" within Section 199 of Code of Criminal Procedure as it would require scrutiny.

"In a democratic nation like India, freedom of speech is a fundamental right guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution. Therefore, a defamatory complaint under Section 499 of the IPC must necessarily be made by an 'aggrieved person' under Section 199 of the CrPC. As such, the threshold has to be higher than usual, especially in the context of public discourse amongst political personalities and parties," the court said.

The top court observed the threshold for placing reasonable restrictions on the freedom of speech and expression was indeed "very high" and several of its verdicts held that there existed a presumption in favour of the accused.

The high court however said the imputations were prima facie "defamatory", with an intention of vilifying the BJP and gaining undue political mileage.

It dismissed the plea moved by Atishi, Kejriwal, former Rajya Sabha MP Sushil Kumar Gupta and AAP leader Manoj Kumar, against the defamation proceedings pending in the trial court.

The high court said the summoning order passed by the trial court for offences under Sections 499 (defamation) and 500 (punishment for defamation) of IPC did not call for any interference.

The AAP leaders had then challenged a sessions court order upholding a magisterial court's decision to summon them as accused on Babbar's complaint.

The AAP leaders sought the quashing of the magisterial court's March 15, 2019 and sessions court's January 28, 2020 orders.

Babbar, who moved the defamation complaint on behalf of BJP's Delhi unit, sought action against the AAP leaders for "harming" the saffron party's reputation by blaming it for the deletion of the voters' names from the electoral rolls.

He claimed that at a press conference in December 2018, the AAP leaders alleged the names of 30 lakh voters from the Bania, Poorvanchali and Muslim communities were deleted by the election commission on BJP's directions.

Kejriwal and the other accused claimed the trial court failed to appreciate that no offence, whether of defamation or otherwise, was made out against them.

The trial court failed to appreciate that the AAP leaders did not make or publish any statement against Babbar or his party as alleged by him, said the plea in the high court.