Reuters: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
NEW DELHI, March 24 – Members of India’s main opposition Congress party held protests in some parts of the country on Friday against leader Rahul Gandhi’s conviction for defamation, a day after a magistrate’s court sentenced Gandhi to a two-year jail term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Congress party officials have described the judgment as politically motivated and blamed the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The BJP is fearful about the rise of Rahul Gandhi and he poses a direct threat to Modi government,” said Pradip Bhattacharya, a Congress party lawmaker from West Bengal state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
BJP president J.P. Nadda dismissed the charges, adding that Gandhi had insulted a section of Indians who happen to share the same surname as Prime Minister Modi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It is one thing to question government regarding the policies, that would be considered a healthy debate, but clearly the Congress has never followed such rules,” he told Reuters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Law Minister Kiren Rijiju told reporters outside parliament that the law was very clear and as of now Gandhi stands to lose his membership following the court judgment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gandhi’s supporters held protests outside Congress party offices and in public spaces in northern Jammu city and in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat states, witnesses and news reports said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gandhi, 52, was found guilty for a 2019 speech in which he referred to thieves as having the surname Modi. He made the comment while campaigning ahead of the last general election to debunk the prime minister’s economic policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gandhi was convicted by a court in the western state of Gujarat, which also granted him bail and suspended the sentence for one month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That gives Gandhi time to appeal but he faces immediate disqualification from parliament following the conviction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Reuters: NEW DELHI, March 24 – Members of India’s main opposition Congress party held protests in some parts of the country on Friday against leader Rahul Gandhi’s conviction for defamation, a day after a magistrate’s court sentenced Gandhi to a two-year jail term. Congress party officials have described the judgment as politically motivated and blamed the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). “The BJP is fearful about the rise of Rahul Gandhi and he poses a direct threat to Modi government,” said Pradip Bhattacharya, a Congress party lawmaker from West Bengal state. BJP… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31061,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31058"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31058\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31060,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31058\/revisions\/31060"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/31061"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}