Three leaders of the Congress were given an order today to remove all of their tweets, videos, and retweets accusing Union Minister Smriti Irani’s daughter of operating an illegal bar in Goa within the next 24 hours.
In a 2-crore defamation claim brought by Smriti Irani, Jairam Ramesh, Pawan Khera, and Netta D’souza were also required to appear in court on August 18.
The High Court ruled that if Congress leaders did not erase their tweets, Twitter would be required to do so.
The tweets, according to the judge, “had gravely injured the plaintiff’s reputation.” Justice Mini Pushkarna stated, “I am of the prima facie conclusion that defamatory claims were made against the plaintiff without checking actual facts.” The judge went on to say, “I deem it proper to pass an interim injunction directing defendants 1-3 (Congress leaders) to delete and remove the allegations made during the press conference from all social media platforms including YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.”
The Congress party had targeted Smriti Irani with claims that her 18-year-old daughter was operating an “illegal bar” in Goa.
The three Congress leaders and their party received a legal notice last week from the Union Minister.
She demanded a written, unqualified apology and the immediate retraction of the accusations made against her daughter.
Ms. Irani challenged the opposing party to provide evidence of any wrongdoing. She charged Congress for “assassinating and publicly mutilating” her daughter’s character. She insisted that her daughter does not own or operate a bar and that she is a first-year college student.
In her case, the plaintiff claimed that the three Congressmen had “conspired with other unknown individuals to launch a series of scathing and aggressive personal insults to disparage and vilify a small kid of the plaintiff who doesn’t even live in the nation.”
