Karnataka High Court stays BJP’s defamation case against CM Siddaramaiah over corruption ad

Bengaluru: The High Court of Karnataka on Friday stayed proceedings against Chief Minister Siddaramaiah in a defamation case filed by the BJP. 

Justice S R Krishna Kumar also ordered a notice to the BJP while adjourning the hearing until July 29.  The party had filed the defamation case in connection with newspaper advertisements entitled “Corruption rate card” against the then ruling BJP government. 

Advocate General Shashikiran Shetty, appearing for the chief minister, called the case “misconstrued”. The court had earlier stayed proceedings against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Deputy Chief Minister and state Congress president D K Shivakumar in the case. 

Congress leaders contended that the proceedings initiated against them were an abuse of the process of law. They also argued that since the BJP was not named in the advertisement, there is no nexus between the complainant and the advertisement. 

The BJP had stated that the KPCC, Rahul, Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar had “conspired and planned to defame” the BJP by levelling false allegations through the advertisement. The advertisement, which appeared on May 5, 2023 in all mainstream newspapers, made “fanciful, baseless, foundation less and irrational” allegations against the BJP, the complaint said. 

The special court for cases involving elected representatives had directed registering the criminal case against the accused persons and the KPCC under IPC Section 499 punishable under IPC Section 500.