'Not intentional': What Rahul Gandhi said in Surat court | Watch

Rahul Gandhi told the court that he has been raising the voices of the people. Whatever he said was not intentional, advocate Jignest told news agency PTI.

In the Surat court on Thursday, as Rahul Gandhi was told that he was held guilty by the court in the defamation case of 2019, the Congress leader told the court that he has been raising voices for the people. "He said to the court that whatever he said was not intentional. Rest my lawyer will say," advocate Jignesh told news agency PTI after Rahul Gandhi was convicted in the 2019 defamation case.

Rahul Gandhi was present at the Surat district court when the verdict in the 2019 defamation case was pronounced on Thursday. (PTI)

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“Rahul Gandhi's lawyer said we are not asking for mercy and we are going for an appeal. And whatever it was, it was not intentional. There was no harm to the complainant or to any other person. So the minimum punishment should be given to Rahul Gandhi. But the prosecution lawyer said that Rahul Gandhi is a member of Parliament and all laws of the country are made in Parliament. If he is given lesser punishment, then a wrong message will be sent across society that those who make laws get lesser punishment. And the prosecution then demanded the maximum punishment in the case,” advocate Jignesh said to PTI before the court pronounced the punishment of two years imprisonment which was then kept in suspension for 30 days.

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Rahul Gandhi'c conviction comes at a time when the BJP and the Opposition political parties are at loggerheads over the continuous action against opposition leaders. Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, AAP Rajya Sabha MP Raghav Chadha, Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray Sena MP Priyanka Chaturvedi condemned the court order.

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.