Allahabad High Court dismisses Congress leader Pawan Khera's plea in defamation case

Lucknow: The Allahabad High Court has dismissed a petition filed by Congress leader Pawan Khera challenging the rejection of his request for a clean chit in a case related to alleged defamatory comments about Prime Minister Narendra Modi's father and linking the prime minister with major industrialists.

The petition was filed against a January 5 order of the chief judicial magistrate (CJM) in Lucknow that had refused to dismiss the case. Khera had challenged the decision at the revisional court, which upheld the CJM's order.

The petition was dismissed by the Lucknow bench of the high court on December 3 and the order uploaded on Thursday.

Justice Rajesh Singh Chauhan dismissed Khera's plea, saying the Congress leader should face the trial.

Opposing Khera's petition, Government Advocate V K Singh pointed out that previous pleas filed by the Congress leader on similar grounds were already dismissed and the current petition was largely based on the same prayers and grounds.

The case was related to "derogatory" comments made by Khera in February 2023 about Modi's father and linking the prime minister with major industrialists.

FIRs were filed on February 20, 2023 at the Cantonment police station in Varanasi and the Hazratganj police station in Lucknow. Another case was registered on February 22, 2023 at a police station in Assam.

Khera had challenged these FIRs before the Supreme Court, which transferred all the cases to the Hazratganj police station on March 20, 2023 for further investigation. Following the investigation, a chargesheet was filed against the Congress leader in the CJM's court in Lucknow.

With the dismissal of his plea, Khera will now have to face the trial in the case.