Kerala court summons Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad in Tharoor defamation case

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor had filed a defamation case against Prasad in December 2018 for passing derogatory remarks on his wife Sunanda Pushkar's death.

File image of Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad | PTI

Thiruvananthapuram: A court here on Saturday summoned Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad to appear before it in a defamation case filed by Congress leader and Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor.

The Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) took cognisance of the complaint and asked the minister to appear before it on May 2, Tharoor’s lawyer told the media.

Tharoor had in December 2018 filed a defamation case against Prasad for allegedly making derogatory remarks in connection with his wife Sunanda Pushkar’s death.

Tharoor had earlier sent a legal notice to Prasad, the minister for Law Justice and IT, seeking an “unconditional apology” for calling him a “murder accused.”

Tharoor has stated that the investigation in the Pushkar case had been completed and the Delhi Police had filed a final report before the Additional Metropolitan Magistrate court, in which he was charge sheeted under Sections 308 and 498 A of the Indian Penal Code.

“The final report does not state that the death of the deceased was a murder,” Tharoor had said.

The Thiruvananthapuram MP and former Union minister said that on October 28 around 5.38 am, Prasad had posted a 2 minute 18 seconds video clip of his press conference, along with certain “false, untrue, malicious and highly defamatory statements on Twitter.”

Tharoor alleged that the video had been posted to defame him and thereby to “spread an untrue, false and scandalous imputation” against him that he is a “murder case” accused and that he had been charge sheeted.

This was intended to “harm” his reputation and “malign” him before the public “by intentionally giving such false and untrue statements, the colour of his office, he had said.

“It is evident that the impugned post/tweet and the contents are solely intended to malign and tarnish the reputation of the complainant,” he stated.

Tharoor had sent a lawyer’s notice to Prasad, seeking an unconditional apology within 48 hours of the receipt of the notice, for levelling the allegations and to delete and remove the video clip of his press conference, along with defamatory statement on Twitter.

In his reply to the notice, Prasad had defended his tweet, saying it was not defamatory.

According to the complainant, the offence against Prasad constitutes the commission of offence defined under Section 499 of the IPC (defamation), which is punishable Under sections 500 (punishment for defamation).

Tharoor had sought appropriate action against Prasad.