Smriti Irani illegal bar: Three Congress leaders were today ordered to be removed within 24 hours for their tweets, videos and retweets accusing Union Minister Smriti Irani’s daughter of running an illegal bar in Goa. Jairam Ramesh, Pawan Khera and Netta D’Souza were also ordered to appear in court on August 18 in the Rs 2 crore defamation suit filed by Smriti Irani.
The High Court said that if Congress leaders fail to delete their tweets, then Twitter will have to do so.
The judge said “the reputation of plaintiffs has been seriously hurt” with the tweet. “It is my prima facie view that the reprehensible allegations were made against the plaintiffs without verifying the actual facts,” Justice Mini Pushkaran said.
Jairam Ramesh confirmed the summons in a tweet. Congress said, “The Delhi High Court has issued notice to us to give a formal reply to the matter filed by Smriti Irani. We are eager to present the facts before the court. We will challenge the spin being pointed out by Ms. Irani and will reject it.” MP tweeted.
Taking a dig at Congress, Union Minister Kiren Rijiju tweeted, “All facts must be verified before making defamation allegations against persons holding high positions or any citizen.”
Smriti Irani was accused by the Congress of her 18-year-old daughter running an “illegal bar” in Goa.
The Union minister had last week sent a legal notice to the three Congress leaders and their party. He demanded an unconditional written apology and immediate withdrawal of the charges against his daughter.
Irani accused the Congress of “murdering and publicly distorting” her daughter’s character and challenged the opposition party to produce evidence of any wrongdoing. She insists that her daughter is a first year college student and does not run a bar.
She said in her lawsuit, “The three Congress leaders conspired to launch a series of scathing and belligerent personal remarks in conjunction with other unidentified persons to defame and defame a young child of the plaintiff.”
Congress had shared a copy of the show cause notice served to a restaurant run by the minister’s daughter, during a press conference. Party spokesperson Pawan Khera had claimed that the license for the bar was taken in the name of a person who was dead for more than a year.
Goa Excise Commissioner Narayan Gad issued a show-cause notice to the restaurant on July 21 on a complaint by lawyer-activist Ayers Rodrigues, who alleged that the owners had submitted “fraudulent and fabricated documents” to obtain the licence.
