Ahmedabad: Senior Congress leader, Loksabha MP and former party president Rahul Gandhi today appeared in two metropolitan courts here in connection with as many defamation cases.

Gandhi who had appeared in a Surat court yesterday in yet another defamation case, arrived here today this afternoon and first appeared in the court of Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate R B Etaliya in connection with the defamation suit filed by Krishnavadan Brahmbhatt, a local BJP corporator, for his remarks at an election rally in Jabalpur on April 23. Gandhi had allegedly said “murder-accused BJP chief Amit Shah, wah, kya shaan hai (how glorious)!”. Brahmbhatt contended that this was slanderous as Shah was acquitted by a CBI court in the Sohrabuddin Shaikh fake encounter case in 2015, and the higher courts did not entertain appeals against the acquittal.

As per the set procedure of plea recording , the court asked his name, age and address and then read out the allegation leveled against him to which he pleaded not guilty ie he said that he has not done any wrong and deny the allegations.

His was later granted bail in the matter and leader of opposition Paresh Dhanani became his bailer. The court fixed December 7 as the next date of hearing in this matter when his plea for permanent exemption from personal appearance would also be heard. He remained in the court room situated on the seventh floor for less than 10 minutes.

After this the congress leader went to another court on the sixth floor in the same building for appearance in connection with the defamation case filed in connection with his remarks and tweets about the alleged involvement of ADC bank in large scale exchange of scrapped notes during demonetization. He had taken a jibe at Amit Shah, who was a director of the bank.The court of woman Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Nirali B Munshi also fixed December 7 as the next date of hearing in this matter. Rahul had earlier appeared in the same court on July 12 when he was granted bail with state party president Amit Chavda as bailer.

Gandhi had appeared before a court in Surat yesterday in connection with the defamation case filed by BJP MLA Purnesh Modi for Rahul Gandhi’s remarks in an election rally in Karnataka during last general elections in which he had allegedly said that ‘Sabhi Modi Chor hain’ (All Modis are thieves). He had pleaded not guilty in that matter during the first appearance and fixed December 10 as the next date of hearing when it will hear on his permanent exemption plea also.

Notably there are in all 3 defamation cases against Gandhi in the former Congress president in Gujarat.

DeshGujarat