Khushi Bajpai
Published on: 21st August, 2022 at 19:17 IST
On Saturday, the Rouse Avenue Court in Delhi acquitted Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and former Aam Admi Party Leader Yogendra Yadav in a 2013 criminal defamation case filed by an advocate.
ACMM Vidhi Gupta Anand was of the view that the complainant had filed to prove his case beyond all reasonable doubts and that the quality and relevancy, and not quantity of evidence, is what determines the fate of a case.
The court, in its order of 81 pages said,
“Culpability can be attached to the accused person only if it is proved that they have committed the alleged offence, which in this case, the complainant failed to do despite several efforts. In these circumstances, as a natural corollary following to the discussion above held, this court cannot be holding the caused persons guilty in the present case.”
Advocate Surendra Kumar Sharma had filed a complaint against the three, alleging that in view of some defamatory newspaper articles, he was falsely presented as a person with a criminal record and doubtful credentials.
The court also observed that the complaint was unable to prove any affirmative act on the part of the accused persons to constitute the offences of defamation.
The court added that, “The case of the complainant becomes weak on the very first aspect itself. When the complaint has been unable to prove that it was the accused persons who gave the alleged defamatory press releases or statements, no questions arises to go into the discussions as to whether those statements were defamatory or not. In other words, where the foundation of the complaint case itself fails, the superstructure built on the same is bound to fail.”