The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued notice to Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi on a plea filed by a pregnant journalist alleging that he pushed her while she was inside the top court's registry during the opposition’s October 12 march to the top court.
Senior Advocate Gaurav Bhatia said that the matter was not coming up despite the top court earlier directing that it would take up the case on October 26.
A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana then issued formal notice to Gandhi.
Bhatia had earlier also expressed doubts over whether a formal notice had been issued in the matter.
On October 16, he had sought listing of the application and clarification on whether the Court had issued notice in the connected matters.
A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi had then said the application would be listed on October 26.
When Bhatia had expressed uncertainty over whether notice had been issued in the matter, CJI Kant clarified,
“Notice has been issued in all matters.”
However, after it did not come up for hearing on October 26, Bhatia flagged the same to the bench today, which then proceeded to issue formal notice to Gandhi.
The application arose from the October 12 march by Opposition leaders to the Supreme Court to submit a petition challenging the Election Commission of India's Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
The march was held amid protests demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged irregularities in the voter list revision exercise.
The journalist, Richa Parashar, alleged that Gandhi had grabbed her and pulled her as she attempted to cover the march, following which she was pushed by his security personnel and fell down. She was subsequently hospitalised. Congress party has denied her claim.