'Issue Apology Or Face Detention': Delhi High Court Pulls Up TMC MP Saket Gokhale On His Failure To Apologize To Lakshmi Puri

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday issued a show cause notice to Trinamool Congress MP Saket Gokhale as to why he should not be committed to civil detention for his failure to comply with the direction to publish apology for defaming Lakshmi Puri, former Indian Assistant Secretary-General to the United Nations.

Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora observed that by not complying with the direction, Gokhale was mocking the Court and the Court process.

The court passed the order while dealing with Puri's plea seeking execution of the decree in her favour.

Senior Advocate Maninder Singh appeared for Puri and submitted that a coordinate bench had on May 09 directed Gokhale to publish the apology within two weeks, a term which got expired on May 23. He said that till date, Gokhale has not complied with the order and thus, he had no right to be heard in the execution proceedings till he published the apology.

Advocate Naman Joshi appearing for Gokhale said that there was no compliance of the direction and that no appeal was filed against the order passed on May 09.

Singh suggested that a local commissioner be appointed who can pay the money and get the apology published in the newspaper on behalf of Gokhale.

However, Joshi said that the apology is personal and the task cannot be delegated to someone else.

To this, the Court asked Gokhale's counsel: “How will I enforce the direction? You are saying that I cannot do this. There are two options. One is that you say you cannot do it. Two, I have to put you in detention…. I am putting you to notice. If you don't publish then we will issue orders of detention.”

“He is not apologising to you. Second, he is breaching the [direction]. According to me he has to go to jail. It is not the question of appointing a LC… the moment LC is appointed to do it, that is not compliance. It has to be from him,” the court told Singh.

Recently, the Court had ordered attachment of Gokhale's salary. Today, the counsel appearing for the Rajya Sabha Secretariat submitted that a compliance report will be filed during the course of the day.

“This Court finds that the stand of the judgment debtor (Gokhale) in not complying with the timelines set out in the original judgment passed in July 1024 and the extended timeline as per order of May 09, it almost appears to the Court that the judgment debtor is mocking at the court and the court process,” the Court said.

“In view of the wilful non compliance of the original judgment and the extended order passed by a coordinate bench on May 09, the judgement debtor is put to notice as to why he should not be committed to civil detention on the principles analogous to Order 21 Rule 32 and Order 21 Rule 41 of Code of Civil Procedure,” it added.

The Court granted one week time to Gokhale to respond to the show cause notice. The matter will now be heard on September 03.

In last year's judgment, a coordinate bench, while decreeing Puri's defamation suit in her favour, had asked Gokhale to put the apology in Times of India. He was also directed to put the apology on his Twitter handle, which had to stay for 6 months. He was also directed to pay Rs. 50 lakh damages to her.

The defamation suit was filed by Puri being aggrieved by Gokhale's tweets referring to a property purchased by her in Switzerland. In the tweets, Gokhale raised questions regarding her and her husband, Union Minister Hardeep Puri's assets. He had also tagged Finance Minister Nirmala Sitaraman in the tweets and sought an ED inquiry.

The suit contended that Gokhale's tweets were false and defamatory. It was Puri's case that the tweets were “maliciously motivated and designed accordingly, laced with canards and entail deliberate twisting of facts”.

In July 2021, a coordinate bench ruled in favour of Puri while deciding the interim injunction application in the suit.

The court had then directed Gokhale to take down the tweets in question within 24 hours. He was also restrained from posting any further defamatory material against Puri.

Title: LAKSHMI MURDESHWAR PURI v. SAKET GOKHALE