Rahul Gandhi gets bail; 2-yr sentence for '…all thieves Modi' remark suspended for 30 days

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has been convicted by a Surat court on Thursday which sentenced him to 2 years in jail in a criminal defamation case over his remark during the 2019 Lok Sabha election. Rahul Gandhi at a rally in Karnataka's Kolar wondered how come "all thieves have Modi as the common surname". Rahul Gandhi was present at the court when the verdict was announced. The Wayanad MP also got bail after the court pronounced the order after paying a bail bond of ₹10,000.

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The Surat court suspended the two-year jail term sentence for 30 days on Rahul Gandhi's plea to move an appeal against his conviction, Livelaw reported.

2-year jail term for Rahul Gandhi on ‘Modi surname’ remark: What was the case?

The case against Rahul Gandhi was brought by Gujarat minister Purnesh Modi. The final arguments in the case resumes in February 2023 after the Gujarat high court vacated the interim stay it had imposed on the proceedings in March 2022 on the complainant's plea demanding the personal appearance of Rahul Gandhi.

Rahul Gandhi's lawyer defended that the proceeding was flawed from the beginning as the proper legal procedure under Section 202 of the CrPC was not followed. Rahul Gandhi's lawyer also argued that Narendra Modi should have been the complainant in the case as Purnesh Modi was not the target of Rahul Gandhi's speech.

The case against Rahul Gandhi was filed under Indian Penal Code Sections 499 and 500. Under Sections 499 and 500, a punishment with simple imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine, or with both, are mentioned in the Indian Penal Code.

Any elected representative who is sentenced for any offence for a period of two years or more faces immediate disqualification under the Representation of Peoples Act, 1951. One provision of the Act that granted three months’ protection from disqualification was struck down in 2013 as “ultra vires” by the Supreme Court in the Lily Thomas case.

In Gandhi’s case, however, the Surat court that declared him guilty has itself suspended his sentence for 30 days in order to give him an opportunity to challenge its decision on the request on his legal team. This means that Gandhi’s disqualification will kick in after a month, unless he is able to get a stay on the conviction (and not just the sentence) from an appellate court – in this case a sessions court – within that period.

Gandhi cannot directly approach the high court or Supreme Court because his conviction is in a criminal case. However, a third party could move the higher judiciary seeking intervention on the grounds that the procedure and manner of the Surat court’s ruling hurt larger public interest.