Hearing in a defamation case against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi pending before a special court here was deferred again on Thursday after the complainant’s lawyer fell ill. The court fixed October 6 as the next date of hearing. The arguments in the case had begun on September 21, but remained inconclusive. Special Judge Shubham Verma subsequently fixed September 29 for further hearing, which was also postponed following the death of a senior advocate.
The court then scheduled the hearing for October 1, but it could not proceed on Thursday as complainant Vijay Mishra’s lawyer, Santosh Kumar Pandey, was unwell. Gandhi’s counsel, Kashi Prasad Shukla, said no hearing took place due to Pandey’s illness.
The case stems from alleged objectionable remarks made by Gandhi against Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the then BJP national president, during an election campaign in Bengaluru in 2018.
Mishra, a local BJP politician and former chairman of the district cooperative bank, filed a defamation complaint against Gandhi on August 4, 2018. On November 27, 2023, the court summoned Gandhi to face trial in the case. He subsequently appeared before the court and secured bail.
Mishra later moved an application seeking to match Gandhi’s voice sample with the alleged remarks. The trial court rejected the plea, a decision that was subsequently upheld by the sessions court. The Allahabad High Court also dismissed Mishra’s petition challenging the orders of the trial court and the sessions court rejecting his application for forensic examination of Gandhi’s voice sample.
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