A Delhi court on Wednesday fixed January 25 for considering the criminal defamation complaint filed by Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) against the CEO of news portal ‘Media Sarkar’ for releasing a “doctored” video allegedly showing some party candidates accepting funds through illegal means.
The AAP’s defamation complaint came up for hearing before Metropolitan Magistrate Akash Jain who said that he would go through the plea first before proceeding ahead.
“Let me go through the matter first then I will proceed,” the magistrate told the counsel appearing for AAP.
During the hearing, advocate V K Ohri, who appeared for AAP, told the court that their complaint is “urgent in nature” as the Assembly elections in Delhi is scheduled on December 4 and the doctored CD was shown on TV to defame the party and its candidates.
“The CD was shown on TV and actual talks were doctored.
You (magistrate) please see the CD and you will see how an offence is committed. They (accused) are trying to defame our candidates. Damage has already been caused by this,” Ohri told the court.
He also alleged that Congress and BJP does not want AAP to “gain momentum” before the upcoming elections and the media portal circulated the CD containing defamatory allegations against the party and its candidates.
The counsel also said that they have got the raw footage of the alleged sting operation from the Election Commission and the court should go through it as it would make it clear that editing was done in the footage which was shown on TV.
The court, however, after hearing the brief submissions posted the matter for January 25, 2014.
“Fix the matter for consideration on pre-summoning evidence for January 25, 2014,” the magistrate said.
Besides Anuranjan Jha, CEO of Media Sarkar, AAP has also named two officials of a private news channel as accused in its complaint saying they constantly carried the story based on alleged sting operation without verifying its “veracity”.