Kerala court summons RS Prasad over defamation suit filed by Shashi Tharoor

Tharoor had earlier sent a legal notice to Prasad seeking an unconditional apology. In his reply to the notice, Prasad had defended his tweet, saying it was not defamatory.

The court of the chief judicial magistrate (CJM) in Thiruvananthapuram on Saturday summoned Union law minister Ravishankar Prasad in a defamation case filed by senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, the Lok Sabha MP from the city, Kerala’s capital.

BJP MP Ravi Shankar Prasad . Congress leader Shashi Tharoor filed a defamation case against Prasad for allegedly making derogatory remarks against him in connection with his wife Sundanda Pushkar’s death in 2014. (Burhaan Kinu/HT PHOTO)

The court took cognisance of the complaint filed by Tharoor in 2018 and asked the minister to appear before it on May 2. Tharoor filed the defamation case against Prasad for allegedly making derogatory remarks against him in connection with his wife Sundanda Pushkar’s death in 2014.

Tharoor had earlier sent a legal notice to Prasad seeking an unconditional apology. In his reply to the notice, Prasad had defended his tweet, saying it was not defamatory. Prasad had rejected the demand for an apology and asked Tharoor to apologize first for calling Prime Minister Modi “a scorpion sitting on a Shiv Linga.”.

Tharoor later sued Prasad in the CJM’s court. He said a video of the press conference where the remarks were made had been posted on social media “which was intended to harm his reputation and malign him before the public.”

Prasad made the comment at a press conference in October 2018 in Delhi in which he allegedly said: “Shashi Tharoor, who is accused in a murder case, has no right to make this comment against the PM.”

Although the minister did not specify the murder case he was citing, the reference was clear. Tharoor’s wife Sunanda Pushkar died mysteriously in a luxury hotel in New Delhi in 2014. Delhi Police, which is investigating the case, charged Tharoor with cruelty and abetment to suicide.

In his complaint, Tharoor stated that the probe into the Pushkar case had been completed and Delhi Police had filed a final report before the additional metropolitan magistrate’s court, in which he was charge sheeted under sections 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) and 498 A (cruelty) of the Indian Penal Code.

“The final report did not state that the death of the deceased was a murder”, Tharoor argued.