Pay Re 1 and tender apology — Sachin Pilot to Congress MLA who alleged Rs 35 cr bribe offer
Politics

Pay Re 1 and tender apology — Sachin Pilot to Congress MLA who alleged Rs 35 cr bribe offer

Sachin Pilot has served a legal notice on MLA Giriraj Singh Malinga, threatening defamation proceedings for his 'false and frivolous' allegations.

   
File image of Rajasthan Deputy Chief Minister Sachin Pilot | Photo: Facebook

File image of Sachin Pilot | Photo: Facebook

Jaipur: Rebel Congress leader Sachin Pilot has served a legal notice on Congress MLA Giriraj Singh Malinga, who had alleged Monday that the former Rajasthan deputy CM offered him Rs 35 crore to switch to the BJP. Pilot has sought a compensation of Re 1 and an apology from Malinga within seven days, saying he will otherwise initiate defamation proceedings against him. 

Malinga had made the allegations Monday, days after Pilot rebelled with 18 MLA in what the Congress has described as an attempt to topple the Ashok Gehlot government in Rajasthan.

“We on behalf of our client above named, hereby call upon all of you to pay to our client a sum of Rs 1 only and to tender a written apology before the press for issuing false and frivolous allegations, within seven days of the receipt of this notice failing which we have further instructions to initiate appropriate proceedings criminal and civil litigation, but not limited to suit for damages and complaint under section 499 and 500 of the Indian penal code, 1816 (which pertain to defamation),” reads the legal notice, which has been accessed by ThePrint. 

According to the notice, Pilot was “disturbed” by the allegations, which were made with the “sole intention of tarnishing his image and to obtain political mileage and to accrue undue advantage to his political opponents”. 

Citing Malinga’s claim that Pilot had first raised the issue with him in December, the notice questions why he kept quiet for so many months. “It is surprising that you had remained silent for a period of over seven months and suddenly raked up the bunch of lies solely with a purpose to malign the impeccable reputation of my client,” the notice adds. “At a time when my client had taken up the onerous task of upholding self-respect of himself and the people who he represents, you had raked up these allegations in order to obtain political mileage,” it further states.

There is a certain section of the party, the notice adds, “that considers him (Pilot) to be a rival” and indulges in this “kind of tactics to bring down his reputation”. 

“The biggest instance of this being the disqualification notices that have been issued to him that are already a subject matter of a proceeding before the Hon’ble High Court of Rajasthan. What is more important is that my Client in those proceedings had categorically made a statement that he is not associated with any political party apart from the INC,” the notice further states. 

It then goes on to list highlights from Pilot’s political career, including his stint as minister in the erstwhile Manmohan Singh government.

“He was also the youngest Member of Parliament when he was elected from (Dausa) in 2004 at the young age of 26,” it says.

Rajasthan crisis

Rajasthan plunged into a political crisis after former deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot declared rebellion on 12 July, claiming to have the support of 30 MLAs. By the next day, however, he could not prove the support of more than 18 legislators.

On 14 July, 19 MLAs, including Pilot, were served notices by Speaker C.P. Joshi, who asked them to respond by last Friday after a petition filed by the chief whip of Congress sought their disqualification from the state assembly.

The Rajasthan High Court Tuesday asked the Rajasthan assembly Speaker to defer action on disqualification notices to dissident Congress MLAs until 24 July, and reserved its judgment on the writ petition filed by Pilot and the 18 dissident legislators until Friday.


Also read: Congress’ 1970-style treatment of young leaders won’t work. It can learn from BJP