Rahul Gandhi’s conviction vs Gujarat High Court’s ‘conviction’

New Delhi: 10 cases including the one involving Veer Savarkar convinced the single bench of the Gujarat High Court that Rahul Gandhi is a serial offender and he need not be shown any leniency in dealing with the defamation case over his "Modi surname" remark.

While dismissing Rahul Gandhi's plea seeking a stay on his conviction, Justice Hemant Prachchhak noted that Gandhi was already facing 10 criminal cases across India, adding that the order of the lower court was "just, proper and legal" in handing over a two-year jail term to Gandhi for his remarks.

There was no reasonable ground to stay the conviction, the high court said.

"He (Gandhi) was trying to stay the conviction on absolutely non-existent grounds. It is a well-settled principle of law that staying of conviction is not a rule, but an exception, resorted only in rare cases. Disqualification is not only limited to MPs and MLAs. Moreover, as many as 10 criminal cases are pending against the applicant," the HC said.

"After this complaint, another complaint was filed in a court in Pune by the grandson of Veer Savarkar for Gandhi's defamatory utterance against Veer Savarkar at Cambridge. Another complaint against him was filed in the concerned court of Lucknow," it said.

In this backdrop, refusal of stay on conviction would not in any way result in injustice to the applicant, the judge said.

"Impugned order passed by the appellate court is just, proper and legal, and does not call for any interference. However, it is hereby requested by the concerned learned district judge to decide the criminal appeal on its own merits and in accordance with the law as expeditiously as possible.

"In view of the above, the present criminal revision application deserved to be dismissed and accordingly it is dismissed," the judge while reading the order.

While noting that there was no reasonable ground to stay the conviction at this stage, Justice Prachchhak also directed the district and sessions court of Surat to hear Gandhi's appeal against the conviction "as expeditiously as possible".

Gandhi will now expect the Supreme Court to show some leniency in the coming weeks.