Delhi High Court Issues Notice On Prashant Bhushan's Plea For Quashing Of Defamation Case By Director, Indiabulls Venture Capital

Bhushan has also sought quashing of the summons issued to him in the criminal case which alleges that "he has made defamatory statements regarding the functioning of Indiabulls group, its promoters, officials and directors, etc vide social media sites namely, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook."

Indiabulls Venture Capital is a part of the Indiabulls Group of companies, a subsidiary of Indiabulls Housing Finance Ltd (IBHFL) and its director has alleged in his case against Bhushan that his "defamatory statements" on various social media platforms have caused substantial damage to the goodwill and reputation of Indiabulls group as well of its promoters, directors and officials.

Arguing against the maintainability of the defamation case, Bhushan has submitted that the Director, who is merely an "employee" of IBHFL does not qualify as an aggrieved person under S.199 CrPC, and that no assertion has been made by the Director that he was personally defamed, and therefore has no locus to file the case.

The criminal case was lodged against Bhushan on a Tweet dated 14.09.2019, wherein Bhushan stated: "Strange that Red Notices are issued against scamsters after they flee country. Mallya's notice was downgraded to allow him to flee. None of them have been brought back. Similar story likely to unfold with promoters of lndiabulls who siphoned off 1000s Crs."

In his quashing plea, he has submitted that the tweet was infact "made in public interest in order to alert the authorities into the irregularities and illegalities being committed by promoters of IBHFL. The purpose of the said tweet was to alert the authorities against a possible loss to the exchequer of thousands of crores of Rupees that IBHFL/ its promoters have borrowed from public banks and institutions." The same being an exception to the offence of defamation under Section 499, Bhushan has claimed he must be protected.