The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Rajya Sabha MP Vivek Tankha to amicably settle the defense case lodged by the Congress lawmaker against the senior BJP leader.Congress leader Tankha has alleged that Chouhan, BJP state president VD Sharma and former minister Bhupendra Singh carried out a “coordinated, malicious, false and defamatory “movement against his political mileage, accusing him of opposing the OBC reservation in the Panchayat elections held in Madhya Pradesh in 2021.
Please don’t let us hear this. Let’s close it. You both sat down to solve the problem, said by Justices MM Sundresh and Rajesh Bindal, appearing in Chouhan and Tankha respectively. The Supreme Court heard Chouhan’s appeal against the Madhya Pradesh High Court order last year and refused to drop the defamation case.
On Wednesday, the bench recommended two senior advocates to resolve the case. Sibar said that if he (Chouhan) expressed his regret, I would like to resolve the defamation case. Yesmalani replied that why the minister is good and if not, he himself had no problem sitting down with Sibar to discuss the case.
The bench, which litigated through video conference, delayed the hearing until May 21. The bench recorded Sibar’s statement that Tankha would not exempt the trial court from opposing Chouhan’s request at the next hearing.
It had earlier extended its order, thus saving Chouhan from the individual appearance of the trial court related to the criminal libel case filed against him by Tankha. Prior to this, the Supreme Court retained bail against three BJP leaders in the defamation case. It seeks Tankha’s response to the attractiveness of Chouhan and other BJP leaders.
Jethmalani once said that the statement mentioned in Tankha’s complaint was published on the floor of the House and was covered by Article 194(2) of the Constitution.
Article 194(2) provides: “No action by the Legislature of the National Legislature shall be against any action in any action he speaks in the Legislature or any committee of any of its committees, and no person shall be liable for any publication of any authorization of any report, paper, voting or proceedings or the House of Representatives of such legal bodies.”
Jethmalani believes that what is unheard of is that the court issued a bail order in the subpoena case, when the parties could appear through their attorneys. Therefore, he seeks the enforcement of bail. Sibal has said they should appear in the trial court in the case to ask what the trial court would do before it appears.
Jethmalani said the two allegedly defamated statements of complainant Tankha were December 22 and 25, respectively, in 2021, respectively, and a case related to a Supreme Court order retained the state’s Panchayat election. On October 25 last year, the High Court refused to revoke Tankha’s defamation case against the BJP leaders.
Tankha said in a complaint in the trial court that he made a defamatory statement in the 2021 campaign in the state’s Panchayat election. He claimed that after an order from the Apex court on December 17, 2021, the BJP leader claimed that the BJP leader had claimed that he opposed the local body’s reservation to his OBC community, which caused damage to its reputation.
Tankha’s plea calls for Rs 1,000 crore compensation and initiation of criminal defamation lawsuits by BJP leaders. On January 20, 2024, a special court in Jabalpur agreed to conduct a defamation case against three BJP leaders under Article 500 of the IPC (Defamation Punishment) and summon them.
