Overview
- A Sultanpur MP/MLA court acquitted Rahul Gandhi in a 49-page judgment delivered on Monday after finding the complainant, BJP leader Vijay Mishra, was not an 'aggrieved person' authorised to bring the complaint.
- The court said Gandhi’s 2018 remark about Amit Shah was directed at a political leader and party and did not prima facie meet the legal test for criminal defamation in the specific legal and political context.
- Magistrate Shubham Verma questioned the credibility of Mishra’s evidence, noting material contradictions in witness accounts about how they viewed the video and finding no independent proof that Mishra’s reputation had been lowered.
- The judgment relied on constitutional free-speech principles and Supreme Court precedent that political discourse between parties requires a higher threshold before it can be treated as criminal defamation.
- Mishra’s lawyer has signalled an appeal to the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court within the statutory period, a move that keeps the legal dispute alive and may test how higher courts apply the aggrieved-person rule.