Supreme Court quashes defamation case against Rahul Gandhi over Savarkar remarks

The Supreme Court on Friday quashed the criminal defamation complaint and summons issued against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his remarks against Hindutva ideologue Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, saying the required sanction had not been obtained in the matter.

A bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu passed the order while hearing Gandhi's challenge to the proceedings initiated against him by a subordinate court.

The bench noted that there was no disclosure of the required sanction in the case.

The court said that the Additional Solicitor General and the complainant's counsel, in an affidavit filed by the Uttar Pradesh government, had submitted that there was no disclosure of sanction. In view of this, the Supreme Court said the complaint and the orders passed by the magistrate stood quashed.

The defamation case relates to comments made by Rahul Gandhi about Savarkar during his Bharat Jodo Yatra in Maharashtra's Akola district on November 17, 2022.

Advocate Nripendra Pandey had filed a complaint alleging that Gandhi intentionally insulted Savarkar during the rally. The complainant alleged that Gandhi's remarks were part of a well-planned conspiracy to defame Savarkar.

Gandhi had challenged the decision of the subordinate court to summon him, arguing against the continuation of the criminal proceedings.

The case was also pursued separately by Satyaki Savarkar, the grandnephew of V D Savarkar, who had filed a defamation complaint in 2023 over remarks Gandhi made about Savarkar during a speech in London.

Satyaki alleged that Gandhi had claimed Savarkar wrote in a book that he and five or six of his friends had beaten up a Muslim man and that Savarkar felt happy about it. The complaint maintained that Savarkar had never written such an account.

The proceedings had reached the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court, which on April 4, 2025, said Gandhi could approach the sessions court with a revision petition. The High Court consequently declined to intervene at that stage.

Gandhi, who is the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, subsequently challenged the subordinate court's decision to summon him before the Supreme Court.