Hearing could not be held in the case filed against Rahul Gandhi, now next hearing on August 23

Hearing could not be held in the MP-MLA court of Sultanpur on Monday in the defamation case related to senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. This happened because the special judge was on leave. Rahul Gandhi’s advocate Kashi Prasad Shukla said that the hearing could not be held due to special judge Shubham Verma being on leave. He said that the next hearing date has been fixed for August 23. Rahul Gandhi appeared in the MP-MLA court on July 26 in the defamation case against him and said that this case has been filed to gain ‘cheap popularity’. According to Shukla, the Congress MP, who appeared before the special judge, said that he had never made any statement against anyone that could make a defamation case against him. The court had fixed August 12 as the date of hearing. Local BJP leader Vijay Mishra had filed a complaint against Gandhi on August 4, 2018 for making alleged objectionable remarks against Union Home Minister Amit Shah in a press conference. The complainant cited Gandhi’s remarks that the BJP claims to believe in honest and clean politics but one of its presidents is “accused” in a murder case. Shah was the BJP president when Gandhi made the remarks. Nearly four years before Gandhi’s remarks, a special CBI court in Mumbai had acquitted Shah in the 2005 fake encounter case when he was minister of state for home in Gujarat.