Political Party Can Be Sued For Defamation: Karnataka HC Declines To Quash Congress Legislator's Suit Against BJP Over Allegedly Defamatory Tweets

The Karnataka High Court on Thursday dismissed a plea filed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seeking to quash a defamation complaint filed by  Indian National Congress Legislator Rizwan Arshad, over allegedly defamatory tweets made by the party against him, in the year 2019.

A single judge bench of Justice Krishna S Dixit said “The tweets A and B if not C and D (as per annexures mentioned in the petition) prima facie hurt the reputation of the complainant, if they are taken at face value, assuming that they are true.”

Further, it held that Section 11 of IPC (Indian Penal Code) inclusively defines a person, and even otherwise, Section 3 (42) (General Clauses Act) gives an inclusive definition of a person.

"That being the position the contention that there can be no legal proceedings for offence of defamation against a political party of the petitioners kind does not merit acceptance,” the Court said.

The petitioners had contended that going by the text of defamation in Sections 499 and 500 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), there cannot be any criminal case against a political party. It was argued that the concept of vicarious liability was alien to criminal jurisprudence unless enacted by a statute and such a proceeding cannot be taken against a political party.

It was argued that there was no prima facie case that merited cognizance being taken against petitioners.

The complainant opposed the plea arguing that the terms of Sections 499 and 500, were very wide in nature since the sections employ the word 'whoever' which can imply a person, natural or legal as the case may be.

Further, it was argued that the word 'person' was also extensively defined in Section 11 of IPC and Section 3(42) of General Clauses Act. 

The bench noted that Sections 499 and 500 of the IPC, seek to protect the reputation of a person, many judgments of the Apex court had held that the right to reputation would fall within the right to life.

“A Man without reputation is treated as a persona non-grata in any civilised jurisdiction, that being the position right not to be defamed inheres in every person and when that is hurt it is open for him to take proceedings either in law of tort or in law of crime or both as the case may be,” it said.

The court refused to accept the argument that the political party was only a society registered under the Societies Registration Act and not a company and therefore did not have a corporate legal personality making it immune to prosecution.

"The contention that there can be no legal proceedings for the offense of defamation against a political party of the petitioners kind does not merit acceptance,” it held.

Following this it dismissed the petition and clarified that all observations made in the present order shall not affect the proceedings before the trial court.  

Case Title: Bharatiya Janata Party AND Rizwan Arshad

Case No: CRL.P 11213/2022

Citation No: 2024 LiveLaw (Kar) 91