Rahul Gandhi returns to parliament after Indian court suspends defamation conviction
India’s parliament reinstated opposition Congress party leader Rahul Gandhi as a member after the country’s supreme court suspended his conviction for defamation, the government said.
Gandhi, whose father, grandmother and great-grandfather were prime ministers, was convicted in March in a case brought by a lawmaker from the ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) over comments in 2019 deemed insulting to the prime minister, Narendra Modi, and others with the same name.
Upon his conviction, Gandhi, 53, lost his parliamentary seat and was jailed for two years but granted bail.
The supreme court last week suspended the conviction, allowing Gandhi to return to parliament and contest a general election due next year. Gandhi has sought to overturn the conviction but his challenge has yet to be heard by a lower court.
The court case and conviction of Gandhi had been seen by critics as an escalation of attacks on the political opposition under the BJP government. Politicians from opposition parties have faced numerous investigations by government agencies and many leaders have been put behind bars.
Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, the leader of Congress in the lower house of parliament, said on Friday that he hoped Gandhi would be reinstated in time for a parliamentary vote of no confidence that the opposition has tabled against Modi this week, over the government’s handling of the outbreak of ethnic violence in the north-eastern state of Manipur, which has killed more than 140 people.
Though the opposition has no hope of winning the vote in parliament, where the BJP commands an overwhelming majority, it is intended to force Modi to speak on the situation in Manipur, a politically sensitive matter he has avoided discussing publicly.
The reinstatement of Gandhi is likely to provide a boost to his Congress party, which last month joined forces with more than 20 other opposition parties in a political coalition called INDIA, to collectively take on the Modi government in the general election.
Reuters contributed to this report