The president of Assam Public Works (APW) Aabhijeet Sharma on Thursday filed a Rs 1 crore defamation case towards former Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi over alleged deceptive and defamatory statements made towards him within the Rajya Sabha MP’s autobiography “Justice for the Decide”. Sharma filed the defamation case towards Gogoi and Rupa Publications, the writer of his autobiography.
Sharma has additionally filed a petition searching for an injunction restraining Gogoi and the writer from additional publishing, distributing or promoting any e-book that has defamatory statements and imputations towards him.
The APW is a Non-Governmental Group (NGO) whose petition within the Supreme Courtroom led to the updation of the Nationwide Register of Residents (NRC) in Assam.
In his petition, the APW chief stated, “Ranjan Gogoi on web page 173 in his autobiography ‘Justice for the Decide’ wrote ‘on the native stage, private assault on the state coordinator of Nationwide Register of Residents (SCNR) Prateek Hajela and veiled assaults on the judges, significantly me, by native politicians and particularly by Aabhijeet Sharma, the President of Assam Public Works (petitioner in W.P(C) No.274 of 2009) left us (the bench) satisfied that orders must be handed to guard Hajela from undue harassment and calculated hurt’.”
“The bench handed the order dated October 18, 2019, for his (Hajela) deputation on inter-cadre switch to Madhya Pradesh, his house state. Subsequent occasions like submitting of FIRs towards Hajela and different NRC officers, allegations of corruption and threats to order Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe apart from monumental misinformation to the media and vast publicity thereof go away me satisfied that the bench was completely justified in passing the slightly uncommon order for the inter-cadre switch of Hajela by invoking Article 142 of the Structure,” Sharma quoted the e-book in his petition as saying.
The APW chief has filed the go well with within the court docket of Kamrup (Metropolitan), Assam.
The court docket stated that after going by means of the petition and paperwork, it was discovered that there’s “substantial query each of regulation and information to be adjudicated”. The court docket directed issuing of summons to each the petitioner and the defendants and posted the subsequent date of listening to for June 3.
Sharma claimed that the imputations towards him within the e-book have been “inherently false and malicious” and have been made with “clear intention to defame” him.
Sharma stated that there was not an iota of proof towards him to substantiate the “inherently false, baseless and malafide” allegations made towards him within the e-book.
He additional claimed that the allegations made by former CJI Gogoi towards him in his autobiography had maligned the sound popularity loved by him and had irreparably tarnished his picture within the eyes of most of the people, viewers, pals, household and colleagues apart from senior officers of the division.
Sharma additionally stated the assertion by the Rajya Sabha MP in his e-book had induced deep psychological agony and anguish and has lowered his popularity and dignity amongst “high-thinking members of the society”.
Ranjan Gogoi served because the forty sixth CJI from 2018 to 2019. Throughout his tenure, he delivered a number of essential judgments, together with the Ayodhya dispute and the Rafale deal, earlier than retiring in 2019.
In 2020, he was nominated to the Rajya Sabha and has served on the committee on communications and data expertise and the committee on exterior affairs.