Jai Anant Dehadrai withdraws defamation case against Mahua Moitra in Delhi High Court

Advocate Jai Anant Dehadrai on Thursday withdrew his defamation case against Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Mahua Moitra in Delhi High Court.."Learned counsel for the plaintiff upon instructions seeks permission to withdraw the suit, the suit is dismissed as withdrawn," Justice Prateek Jalan recorded in his order. .Dehadrai had sued Moitra for defamation. He had argued that the former Member of Parliament (MP) from West Bengal made several defamatory allegations against him and gave interviews to the media alleging that he is “jobless” and “jilted”..As the case came up for hearing today, advocate Raghav Awasthi appeared for Dehadrai and said that he is ready to withdraw the suit if Moitra makes a statement that she will not make a statement against him which are palpably false. Advocate Samudra Sarangi appeared for Moitra and said that he will obtain instructions on the same. Justice Jalan remarked that the suggestion by Dehadrai is positive that if the two sides come to an understanding about not making personal allegations against each other and if the dispute is taken out of public domain, it would benefit both sides."If it is possible to take this dispute out of public domain and play it before the statutory authorities or privately then that seems...," the Court said.Justice Jalan added that the lawyers from two sides can sit together and come up with the wording of the order which will be applicable to both.Awasthi then said that he is withdrawing the suit unconditionally."I would then like to withdraw this suit. I would like to withdraw unconditionally," he said.The Court allowed the request..In his defamations suit, Dehadrai had sought directions to restrain Moitra from making the defamatory allegations against him.The ₹2 crore defamation suit also sought orders against media organisations CNN News 18, India Today, Gulf News, The Guardian and The Telegraph to take down the defamatory content against him and not to publish such content against him.Similar directions had also been sought against X (earlier Twitter) and Google.Dehadrai had earlier alleged that Moitra accepted bribes from businessman Darshan Hiranandani for asking questions in Parliament. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Nishikant Dubey filed the complaint before the Lok Sabha Speaker.Moitra subsequently sued Dehadrai and Dubey for defamation. However, the TMC leader’s plea for interim injunction was rejected by the High Court.It held that the allegations that Moitra shared her parliamentary login credential with Darshan Hiranandani and received gifts from him were not "totally false”..During the previous hearing of Dehadrai's defamation case on April 8, the High Court had expressed displeasure with him for speaking to the media with regards to the case. The Court had said that just because there is no injunction against Dehadrai, he cannot keep making allegations against Moitra even though his suit is pending. If this continues, then Moitra has a right to defend herself, the Bench had said..Justice Jalan had also cautioned Moitra that she cannot make palpably false statements against Dehadrai or call him ‘lunatic’.Justice Jalan had said that he will have no hesitation in passing an injunction order with respect to such statements.