India Opposition Head Gandhi to Appeal Conviction That Cost Him Parliament Seat

Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi will appeal against a court order that led to his disqualification from parliament and could result in a two-year jail term.

(Bloomberg) — Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi will appeal against a court order that led to his disqualification from parliament and could result in a two-year jail term.

Gandhi will move an appeal at a court in the western city of Surat Monday asking for a stay on the conviction, said Manhar Patel, the Congress party’s local district president. 

Gandhi needs the district-level criminal court to put a hold on his conviction or grant him an extension of bail to avoid going to jail once the thirty-day grace period to appeal lapses. He can also move the Gujarat High Court if the district court doesn’t allow him relief.

A court in Surat on March 23 sentenced him to two years in jail for allegedly making derogatory remarks in 2019 about Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s surname but suspended the sentence for a month.

Gandhi, the scion of India’s Nehru-Gandhi political dynasty that ruled the country for decades after independence, was quickly removed from parliament after his conviction. He also faces the risk of being barred from contesting national elections due next year.

Indian law stipulates that anyone sentenced to serve two or more years of jail time cannot run for elections for six years after they complete their prison term. However, if Gandhi is eventually exonerated his parliamentary seat should, by law, be returned. A member of parliament from the island district of Lakshadweep recently had his membership reinstated after a court suspended his criminal conviction.

The legal developments are an immediate setback for the 52-year-old politician who has positioned himself as a challenger to Modi and his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party — even though his Congress party has been routed in two consecutive national ballots. 

However, Gandhi’s conviction by a court in Modi’s home state of Gujarat has also angered several opposition parties, indicating that the Congress leader could use the setback to try and gain a political edge. The BJP has said the law is equal for everyone.

To revive his Congress party, Gandhi recently completed a 2,170-mile trek from India’s southernmost tip to the icy north of Kashmir. After his ouster from parliament, he vowed to keep questioning Modi on his alleged ties to business tycoon Gautam Adani, who has been battling allegations of fraud and market manipulation from a US short seller. Adani’s conglomerate has denied the report.

“My own sense is that a court will overturn the verdict, partly because it’s such an absurd verdict on the face of it,” Sadanand Dhume, a senior fellow at American Enterprise Institute, said in a Bloomberg TV interview last week. “What Mr. Gandhi has said four years ago in his speech was, to my mind, not particularly offensive, clearly within the ambit of normal political speech in any democracy.”

–With assistance from Shruti Mahajan and Eltaf Najafizada.

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