Indian opposition dealt major blow as parliament bars Congress leader Gandhi

reuters.com

4 points·syliconadder··4 comments

> The court case was filed by BJP member Purnesh Modi, who focused on a comment Gandhi made in the 2019 speech when referring to two fugitive businessmen, both surnamed Modi.

> "How come all thieves have the name Modi?," Gandhi had asked.

> The magistrate said a two-year jail term was justified because "awarding a lighter sentence to the accused would send a wrong message to people".

Two years for that comment. Wow

He also said "if you look around you will find a lot more Modis [that are thieves]".

In case it isn't clear, he messed up by making derogatory statement based on someone's caste. He should have known better, especially as an elected representative. He is lucky "Modi" isn't classified as Scheduled Caste/Tribes, rather as "Other backward castes". The provisions of SC/ST act[0] are even more draconian (no anticipatory bail, higher mandatory minimum sentences).

Definitely politically motivated in this case and definitely need to fix the criminal defamation laws, but he needs to be treated the same way a common man would.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scheduled_Caste_and_Scheduled_...

Modi and his ministers make remarks that cover the whole Muslim population and that too in bad taste. The courts don't seem to be paying attention to that.

Do you have any specific examples of cases being filed against them that the courts are not paying attention to? Courts job is not to police the population. If someone files a case and argues the merits of it, why wouldn't the courts pay attention?

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