Goa Cong stages protest against Guj HC’s refusal to stay Rahul Gandhi’s conviction in defamation case

PTI, Jul 7, 2023, 5:35 PM IST

Congress workers and leaders in Goa on Friday staged a protest against the Gujarat High Court’s refusal to stay party leader Rahul Gandhi conviction in a criminal defamation case over his ”Modi surname” remark. More than a 100 Congress workers, led by Goa Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) president Amit Patkar, held a demonstration at Azad Maidan here in the afternoon.

Talking to reporters, Patkar said the high court’s verdict was “unfortunate” and was a “murder of the democracy”. “We have to understand why Rahul Gandhi is being targeted. He is raising the issues of common people and he is against the BJP. The Modi government is dividing people and Rahul Gandhi wants to bring them together,” Patkar said.

He further alleged that the Modi government disqualified Gandhi by raising fake cases against him after he questioned connections between Modi and the Adani Group.

The Gujarat High Court dismissed Gandhi’s plea for stay citing that the Congress leader was already facing 10 criminal cases across India. It noted 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.