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The High Court while upholding the Surat Magistrate\u2019s decision noted that the order of conviction would not result in any injustice to the applicant and that the order was just, proper and legal. While upholding the decision the Surat Court also took note of the pending criminal cases against Rahul Gandhi and said that Representative of People should remain of clear character.<\/p>\n
Background<\/strong><\/p>\n In 2019, ex-MP Rahul Gandhi in his speech had said \u2013 \u201cHow come all the thieves have \u2018Modi\u2019 as common surname?\u201d<\/em> He had also linked the Prime Minister with fugitives like Nirav Modi and Lalit Modi in his speech.<\/p>\n Purnesh Modi, a former Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) from Surat West took objection of the speech and approached the Court against Rahul Gandhi\u2019s claiming that speech humiliated and defamed people with Modi surname.<\/p>\n The Surat magistrate court took cognizance of the offence and convicted him with two years of imprisonment observing that since Rahul Gandhi is a Member of Parliament (MP) he should have exercised restrain as whatever he would say would have a greater impact.<\/p>\n It is to be noted that the sentence of two years of imprisonment is the maximum possible punishment of imprisonment in criminal defamation cases. It is also to be noted the effect of such punishment has led to Rahul Gandhi\u2019s disqualification as an MP as Section 8(3) of the Representative of People Act, 1951<\/strong> mandates that an MP or an MLA who has been convicted for an offence and sentence to imprisonment of two year or more would be liable to be disqualified from the date of conviction for a period of six years.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” overflow=”visible” overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none”][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all” column_element_direction_desktop=”default” column_element_spacing=”default” desktop_text_alignment=”default” tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_backdrop_filter=”none” column_shadow=”none”…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":413,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[15,23,27,26,37,25,36,29,28,41,17,16,38,33,32,39,31,42,40,43,34,24,30,35],"class_list":{"0":"post-412","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-newsupdates","8":"tag-advocate","9":"tag-conviction","10":"tag-criminal-defamation","11":"tag-defamation","12":"tag-disqualification","13":"tag-gujarat-high-court","14":"tag-imprisonment","15":"tag-indian-penal-code","16":"tag-ipc","17":"tag-lalit-modi","18":"tag-lawyer-in-delhi","19":"tag-lawyer-in-gurgaon","20":"tag-lily-thomas","21":"tag-member-of-parliament","22":"tag-mla","23":"tag-modi","24":"tag-mp","25":"tag-narendra-modi","26":"tag-nirav-modi","27":"tag-prime-minister","28":"tag-purnesh-modi","29":"tag-rahul-gandhi","30":"tag-representative-of-people","31":"tag-surat"},"yoast_head":"\n