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PM Modi Degree Defamation Case| Ahmedabad Court Issues Fresh Summons To Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, RS MP Sanjay Singh
Sparsh Upadhyay
23 May 2023 5:21 PM IST
A Court in Gujarat's Ahmedabad District today issued a fresh summons to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Aam Aadmi Party's Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh in a criminal defamation complaint filed by Gujarat University for their (Kejriwal & Singh) alleged derogatory statements made in connection with the controversy regarding Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s academic degree. The...
A Court in Gujarat's Ahmedabad District today issued a fresh summons to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Aam Aadmi Party's Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh in a criminal defamation complaint filed by Gujarat University for their (Kejriwal & Singh) alleged derogatory statements made in connection with the controversy regarding Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s academic degree.
The fresh summons, directing the duo to appear before on June 7, was issued by the court of Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Jayeshbhai Chovatiya today after it was informed that the summons issued by the court last month directing them to appear on May 23 does not appear to have been received by them.
#JustIn | [PM Modi Degree Controversy]Ahmedabad Court ISSUES FRESH SUMMONS to the Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) & Aam Aadmi Party’s RS MP Sanjay Singh (@SanjayAzadSln) in a #Defamation case filed by #GujaratUniversity over their alleged derogatory remarks. pic.twitter.com/iz1zo9TeoS— Live Law (@LiveLawIndia) May 23, 2023
The summons has been issued in a criminal complaint filed by Gujarat University, through its Registrar Dr Piyush M.Patel under Section 500 of the Indian Penal Code. Last month, the court found a prima facie case against them.
Essentially, in the complaint, the alleged statements of Kejriwal and Singh have been referred to, accusing them of making sarcastic and defamatory statements in press conferences and on Twitter handles targeting the university over Modi's degree. The alleged statement is as follows:
"अगर डिग्री है और वो सही है तो डिग्री दी क्यों नहीं जा रही है...गुजरात और दिल्ली यूनिवर्सिटी डिग्री क्यों नहीं दे रही हैं? डिग्री इसलिए नहीं दे रहे हैं कि डिग्री हो सकता है फर्जी हो, डिग्री नकली हो...अगर प्रधानमंत्री जी दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय से पढे, गुजरात यूनिवर्सिटी से पढे, तो गुजरात यूनिवर्सिटी को सेलीब्रेट करना चाहिए कि हमारा लड़का जो है देश का प्रधानमंत्री बन गया...वो उनकी डिग्री को छुपने की कोशिश कर रहे हैं...(यूनिवर्सिटी) प्रधानमंत्री की फर्जी डिग्री को सही साबित करने में जुट गई [If degree is there and it is correct then why degree is not being given... Why Gujarat and Delhi University are not giving degree? The degree is not being given because the degree may be fake... If the Prime Minister studied from Delhi University, Gujarat University, then Gujarat University should celebrate that our boy has become the Prime Minister of the country. ...it is trying to hide his degree...[Univerisity] put his all to prove a fake degree (of PM) as right]," is the statements that have been attributed to Kejriwal by the University in its complaint."
The complaint states that the alleged statement was made right after the Gujarat High Court order quashing and setting aside the 2016 order of the Central Information Commission (CIC) directing the Gujarat University to provide “information regarding degrees in the name of Mr. Narendra Damodar Modi" to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
The Complaint further states that immediately after the Gujarat High Court's order, Kejriwal made defamatory statements against Gujarat University in a press conference despite being aware of the fact that the Prime Minister's degree has been published on the University's website long back.
Importantly, the university has also put up a contention in its complaint that CM Kejriwal made the statements in his “personal capacity” and “not affairs of the State”. Agreeing with this submission, the Court last month ordered to delete the word ‘Chief Minister’ from Kejriwal’s name in the cause title of the case.
"It is natural that due to the statements of the accused people who know the credit of Gujarat University and all the people who do not know Gujarat University will develop distrust towards Gujarat University," the Court observed.
The Court also opined that if the political office bearers, instead of fulfilling their duty to their people, do any work directly or indirectly for their personal enmity or selfishness, to harm the opponents or the same person, and if they utter any such words, those words will be considered a violation of the trust placed by the people and the words uttered will be considered personal.
