Rahul Gandhi, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, has asked a Pune court to start contempt of court proceedings against Satyaki Savarkar. Savarkar is the person who brought a criminal defamation action against Gandhi for allegedly defaming liberation fighter Vinayak Damodar Savarkar.
Amol Shinde, a First Class Judicial Magistrate of the Special MP/MLA court, will hear the application on August 13.
The plea, which was filed by Advocate Milind Pawar, said that Satyaki Savarkar intentionally did not provide important evidence, like material documents and electronic evidence in a usable form, even though the court ordered him to do so several times.
The defense says that Savarkar gave the accused a pen drive on May 9, 2025, instead of a CD that he had filed with the court. It was said that the pen drive was broken. It was neither accessible nor readable on any electronic equipment available with the defence.
The petition said that the court never gave the complaint the original CD and transcript, which were very important to their claims, even though the court had told them to do so. This exhibited an obvious disregard and disrespect towards the authority of the court, amounting to contempt of court.
The plea further said that it hurt the accused's (Gandhi's) right to prepare and present his defense properly.
Gandhi further accused Satyaki Savarkar of producing inconsistent documents, notably two distinct versions of a family tree. One version purportedly deleted the name of his mother, Himani Savarkar, supposedly tied to Nathuram Godse’s family.
It generated severe issues regarding the legitimacy and dependability of the papers presented by the complaint. The plea went on to say that the complainant's actions showed carelessness and arrogance.
Earlier on July 11, Gandhi pleaded not guilty in the criminal defamation action.
The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha did not appear directly before the court on July 11. He submitted a motion through his lawyer Milind Pawar, requesting permission to make submission through his Counsel.
Special Judge Amol Shinde approved the application and proceeded to record Gandhi’s statement.
The Special Judge then read out the speech in question in the court and said that as per the complaint and the information on record, Gandhi would face trial under Section 500 IPC.
A criminal defamation complaint was filed against the Congress leader by Satyaki Savarkar, grandnephew of VD Savarkar. The accusation said that Gandhi persistently defamed Savarkar on several occasions over the years.
Satyaki highlighted an instance of March 5, 2023, when Gandhi addressed the Overseas Congress in the United Kingdom.
The complaint alleged the Congress leader purposely made outlandish charges against VD Savarkar, knowing them to be inaccurate, with the intention of hurting Savarkar’s reputation and causing mental suffering to the complainant and his family.
Although the defamatory speech was delivered in England, but its influence was felt in Pune as it was published and spread throughout India, stated the petition.
The complaint mentioned multiple news sources and a YouTube link to a video of Gandhi’s address in London as evidence. Satyaki stated that Gandhi falsely accused Savarkar of publishing a book in which he described that he and his associates assaulted a Muslim guy and gained some pleasure from it.
As per Satyaki, Savarkar never wrote about any such incident and that such an incident never happened.
Gandhi made these outlandish, baseless and vicious claims with the explicit objective of defaming Savarkar and destroying his character, he said.
Satyaki requested highest punishment for Gandhi under Section 500 IPC and maximum compensation under Section 357 CrPC.
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