Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Nishikant Dubey and Advocate Jai Anant Dehadrai have apprised the Delhi High Court that they would take down the social media posts against Trinamool Congress leader and Member of Parliament Mahua Moitra.
The AITC MP moved the High Court against a defamatory Facebook post made by Dubey and a screenshot of the post tweeted by Dehadrai on X (formerly known as Twitter).
The single-judge Bench of Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora noted on Friday that Dubey had taken down the post, while Dehadrai, appearing in person, agreed to delete the tweet.
The Court disposed of the plea on the grounds of the submissions made by Dubey and Advocate Dehadrai.
Representing Moitra, Advocate Samudra Sarangi had earlier submitted that the posts were defamatory, baseless and made without justification.
Appearing for Dubey, Senior Advocate Abhimanyu Bhandari claimed that the post was based on an order of the Lokpal regarding an enquiry conducted by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) over Moitra’s alleged foreign bank accounts.
The Senior Counsel contended that everything posted on X by Dubey was taken from the detailed judgment passed by the Lokpal. The BJP leader only mentioned in the post what was already in public domain, including the CBI probe and the allegations of wrongdoing.
The High Court, however, said that prima facie the allegations made in the social media posts by Dubey and Dehadrai were not supported by the Lokpal verdict relied upon by them.
The single-judge Bench directed both Dubey and Dehadrai to take down the posts.
The Counsel for Dubey also referred to a certain letter which formed the basis for the posts.
The single-judge Bench, however, noted that the Senior Counsel was not able to disclose the particulars of this letter.
Dubey claimed that Moitra repeatedly referred to him with a derogatory name, ‘Pitbull’.
The Court then asked Advocate Sarangi to talk to Moitra regarding the same.
The fresh application was filed by Moitra in her already pending defamation case against Dubey and Dehadrai.
The two had alleged that Moitra asked questions in Parliament and shared her Parliament account login credentials with industrialist Darshan Hiranandani in return for favours and expensive gifts.
Based on these allegations, the Lok Sabha Ethics Committee had suggested Moitra’s removal from the lower house, following which she was expelled from the Parliament on December 8, 2023.
Moitra rebuffed the allegations saying that that Hiranandani was her friend and there has been no quid pro quo. She further said that allegations were part of political vendetta.
Advocate Dehadrai and Dubey claimed that Moitra gave complete access to her online Lok Sabha account to Hiranandani, who used the same to post parliamentary questions of his liking.
They alleged that out of 61 questions asked by Moitra, 50 were suggested by Hiranandani.