Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Sunday said that he will file a defamation suit against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for a social media post suggesting that the former and four other BJP leaders had links with the Adani Group.
US-based Hindenburg Research has alleged the Adani Group had “engaged in a brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme over the course of decades”
Addressing a news conference here, Sarma said: “Look whatever Rahul Gandhi has tweeted, it is a defamatory tweet. So, once the Prime Minister leaves the state, we will respond to the tweet and definitely, there will be a defamation case in Guwahati.”
Sarma added: “But not now. I don’t want to talk about politics because we want to celebrate Bihu. So after April 14 that (defamation issue) will be there.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit Guwahati on April 14.
Rahul’s tweet in Hindi on Saturday said: “They hide the truth, that’s why they mislead every day! The question remains the same – who has Rs 20,000 crore benami money in Adani’s companies?”
Rahul posted what resembled the logo of the Adani Group with five names which Congressmen said were of former party leaders Ghulam (Nabi Azad), (Jyotiraditya) Scindia, Kiran (Kumar Reddy), Himanta (Biswa Sarma) and Anil (Antony). Antony and Reddy joined the BJP on Thursday and Friday respectively.
Rahul was in March convicted by a Surat court in the “Modi surname” criminal defamation case for two years, following which he was disqualified from the Lok Sabha as MP. He was also asked to vacate his official residence.
However, Sarma, who had joined the BJP in 2015, had dropped broad hints at a possible legal case against Rahul in his response to the tweet on Saturday. “It was our decency to have never asked you, where have you concealed the proceeds of crime from the Bofors and National Herald scams. And how you allowed Ottavio Quattrocchi to escape the clutches of Indian justice multiple times. Anyway, we will meet in the Court of Law,” Sarma tweeted.
The Bofors arms deal scam erupted during the reign of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1986. The ED is probing financial irregularities involving the National Herald.
