The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Friday dismissed BJP MP Kangana Ranaut’s plea to quash a defamation complaint filed against her, along with the summoning order issued by a Bathinda court.
Kangana had challenged the case, which was based on a tweet she posted during the 2020–21 farmer protests. In her retweet, she allegedly misidentified 73-year-old Mahinder Kaur from Bahadurgarh Jandian village in Bathinda as Bilkis Bano, popularly known as the “Shaheen Bagh dadi.”
Mahinder Kaur filed the defamation complaint in 2021, claiming that Kangana's tweet was false and hurtful, damaging her reputation.
"There are specific allegations against the petitioner who is a celebrity, that false and defamatory imputations by her in the retweet have dented the respondent's reputation and lowered her in her own estimation, as also in the eyes of others. Therefore, filing of the complaint to vindicate her rights cannot be termed mala fide," Justice Tribhuvan Dahiya stated this in the order while dismissing Ranaut's plea.
"... A reading of the impugned order as a whole, makes it apparent that the Magistrate (Bathinda court) has duly applied mind to the material on record, and only after recording satisfaction that commission of offence under Sections 499 IPC is prima facie made out against the petitioner, the process has been issued..," the order reads.
Ranaut had moved the High Court under Section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code, seeking to cancel both the defamation complaint (filed under Sections 499/500 of IPC) and the February 22, 2022 summoning order. The High Court, however, found no grounds to interfere and rejected her plea.
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