Delhi HC refuses to quash defamation case against Tharoor over remarks against PM

The Delhi high court on Thursday refused to quash the defamation proceedings against Congress MP Shashi Tharoor by Bharatiya Janat Party (BJP) leader Rajiv Babbar for his alleged “scorpion on Shivling” remark against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“The petition is dismissed,” a bench of justice Anoop Kumar Mendiratta said while pronouncing the verdict.

The MP had appealed against the city court’s order of April 2019 summoning him as an accused in the criminal complaint.

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The summoning order was passed after Babbar’s plea, who had filed a complaint against Tharoor alleging that the comments hurt his religious sentiments. Besides seeking to set aside the summoning order, Tharoor had also sought for quashing of Babbar’s complaint.

In his petition before the high court, Tharoor had claimed that trial court’s order was bad in law and against the settled principles of criminal jurisprudence, as it overlooked the fact that Babbar’s complaint was “completely false and frivolous”.