New Delhi: Saket Gokhale, Trinamool Congress MP and Rajya Sabha member, has been ordered to pay Rs 50 lakh in damages by the Delhi high court to former diplomat Lakshmi Puri in a defamation suit filed by her against him.
The case pertains to June 2021 when Gokhale tweeted that Puri had purchased a property in Switzerland disproportionate to her income. He had also referred to her husband Hardeep Singh Puri, Union minister for petroleum and natural gas. The Rajya Sabha MP had also tagged Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and sought an Enforcement Directorate inquiry.
Puri had moved the court calling Gokhale’s tweets “maliciously motivated and designed accordingly, laced with canards and entail deliberate twisting of facts”, Livelaw reported.
In July 2021, a coordinate bench ruled in favour of Puri while deciding the interim injunction application in the suit. It had directed Gokhale to remove the allegedly defamatory tweets. He had also been restrained from posting any defamatory content against the Puris.
According to her, Gokhale had falsely claimed that her income could have only been Rs 10-12 lakh as she was on a deputation from the Government of India to the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
The court at that time in the interim order had said, “Reputations, nourished and nurtured over years of selfless service and toil, may crumble in an instant; one thoughtless barb is sufficient.”
When the matter once again came up for hearing on Monday, July 1, Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani asked Gokhale to publish an apology to Puri in The Times of India newspaper alongside paying Rs 50 lakh in damages. He also directed Gokhale to put out an apology on X (Twitter) handle, which has to stay for six months.
Gokhale has been given eight weeks to comply with the court orders.
