Arvind Kejriwal seeks to quash defamation suit over Twitter remark

Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday moved the Delhi High Court, seeking to quash a defamation case filed against by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Vijender Gupta.

Gupta had filed the defamation suit, alleging that his image was maligned when Kejriwal allegedly accused him, on Twitter, of being part of an alleged “conspiracy” to kill Kejriwal. Gupta had accused the CM and the deputy CM of “maligning” his image.

Justice Manoj Ohri, while hearing the plea, pointed to an earlier high court ruling, which stated whether re-tweets would constitute an offence of defamation. The counsels for Kejriwal were also asked to go through the judgment and ascertain whether it would be applicable in the instant case.

Appearing for Kejriwal, senior advocate Vikas Pahwa and advocate R Arunadhri Iyer claimed that he had neither mentioned Gupta in his tweet nor made any allegation against him. They, however, said that Kejriwal had re-tweeted Sisodia’s tweet, but with his own comment, in which also Gupta was not mentioned.

In his plea, Kejriwal contended that he has neither made a defamatory comment nor mentioned Gupta by name.

After Kejriwal was slapped in May this year during the general election campaign, he had alleged on Twitter that there was a conspiracy to get him murdered by his own personal security officer.

In response, Gupta had said that Kejriwal was slapped because he had relaxed his security cordon.