The Supreme Court of India (SC) will, on November 14, deliver its verdict on petitions seeking a review of its judgement giving a clean chit to the Narendra Modi government in the Rafale fighter jet deal with French firm Dassault Aviation.
On May 10, the apex court had reserved its decision on the pleas, including that filed by former union ministers Yashwant Sinha, Arun Shourie and activist lawyer Prashant Bhushan. The plea seeks a re-examination of its findings that there was no occasion to doubt the decision-making process in the procurement of 36 Rafale fighter jets.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to pronounce on November 14 its verdict on the criminal contempt plea filed against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi by BJP MP Meenakshi Lekhi for wrongly attributing to the apex court his "chowkidar chor hai" remark in Rafale case against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Gandhi, who was then the President of the Congress Party, had told the bench that he has already tendered unconditional apology for wrongly attributing the remarks relating to the Prime Minister to the apex court.
A Bench comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi and Justices SK Kaul and KM Joseph are likely to pronounce verdicts on three review petitions filed by the trio, lawyer Vineet Dhandha and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) lawmaker Sanjay Singh. CJI Gogoi is set to retire on November 17.
On December 14, 2018, the top court dismissed the petitions seeking an investigation into alleged irregularities in the Rs 58,000 crore deal.
BJP’s National Spokesperson Syed Shahnawaz Hussain hastweetedin Hindi: Truth triumphs. Truth can be bothered, but not defeated.
On the ending of contempt proceedings against Rahul Gandhi, PL Punia said: "The proceedings have been dismissed. He has just been warned. And it is not on ‘chowkidar chor hai’ but attributing it to the SC. I believe the warning is just not for Rahul Gandhi but for all political leaders who end up saying a lot of things in the heat of election campaigning."
Congress’ PL Punia has said that the party respects the court's decision.
"Court has said there is no ground for an FIR now. But that does not mean that all facts have been examined. Even in the future, when new details emerge, they will be put in the public domain and be politically discussed."
I hope that Rahul Gandhi does not lie this way in the future. We welcome the court’s verdict. Today, he was saved by the court for apologising. However, the people of the country had punished him and the Congress party earlier.
According to Live Law, Justice KM Joseph wrote a separate but concurring verdict stating that the scope of judicial review on such matters is very limited.
The bench while pronouncing its verdict in the criminal contempt case against Rahul Gandhi for wrongfully attributing the “chowkidaar chor hai” jibe to SC, said that the Congress leader should be more careful in future.
And, with that word of caution, it ended the contempt proceedings against Gandhi.
Justice SK Kaul, who was reading out the verdict, said that there are no grounds to order an FIR and that the court cannot initiate a "roving and fishing inquiry".
The court, pronouncing that there is no grounds for an FIR, has dismissed the review petitions in the Rafale case.
JUST IN: The Supreme Court has also closed proceedings in the criminal contempt case against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
The Sabarimala matter has been referred to a larger seven-judge bench. SC is now expected to take up the Rafale verdict now.
Petitioner Prashant Bhushan had alleged suppression of material facts from the court by the Centre and said that as many eight critical clauses of the standard defence procurement procedure were dropped in the deal in the meeting of Cabinet Committee on Security in September 2016.
One of the clauses dealt with the aspect that the government can cancel the deal if the information of any involvement of middleman comes to the light, he said.
He had referred to the news articles and said that three experts of Indian Negotiation Team (INT) had also raised the objections to the inflated pricing of the aircraft.
