On Saturday, December 10, the Meghalaya government filed a criminal defamation suit against Trinamool Congress (TMC) national spokesperson Saket Gokhale for maligning the reputation of the state government by making “deliberate, derogatory and malicious” claims against a state-owned tourism firm.
The action comes days after Saket Gokhale claimed that there was Rs 632 crore worth of financial violations in the Meghalaya Ecotourism Infrastructure Development Project by an IAS officer Dr Vijay Kumar.
Meghalayan Age Limited, a state-owned company, filed a lawsuit in the East Khasi Hills District Court of the Chief Judicial Magistrate under Section 200 read with Section 190 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973. The company sought Saket Gokhale to be charged with criminal defamation in accordance with section 499.
On December 4, TMC’s Saket Gokhale said that the Meghalaya Ecotourism Infrastructure Development Project had anomalies of Rs 632 crore. According to Saket Gokhale, “These irregularities have happened under the company Meghalayan Age which is spearheaded by CM Conrad Sangma’s top aide IAS officer D Vijay Kumar.”
‘He has become like a psycho’: Meghalaya Deputy CM Prestone Tynsong slams the TMC leader for spreading fake news
The Meghalaya government had hit out at the Trinamool Congress leader terming him a ‘psycho’. Deputy Chief Minister Prestone Tynsong slammed Gokhale saying that the TMC leader intended just to spoil the government’s image.
“This man keeps making such allegations about the functioning of the state government. I personally feel he has become like a psycho. Now we have no more patience. By tomorrow, we will have filed a defamation case against him,” said Tynsong.
Refuting all of the accusations levelled against the government, the deputy chief minister asserted that all records are accessible and that even the tendering procedure was conducted online.
Lambasting the TMC leader Tynsong told the media that the allegations should be substantiated with documents but “this man it seems he just knows from here and there and ultimately he puts it in the public domain and brings out the allegation in the form of a statement, which is totally wrong.”
He said the government can no longer tolerate such irresponsible acts.
“We have no more patience. The allegations made by him are baseless and wrong. By tomorrow, we are going to file a defamation case against this man, who unfortunately last night or today morning was also picked up by the Gujarat police because of the allegation he made against the Prime Minister. So you can understand the credential of the so-called national spokesperson of the AITC”, Tynsong said.
TMC’s Saket Gokhale sent to two-day police custody for spreading fake news relating to Morbi bridge tragedy
Notably, on December 7, an Ahmedabad court remanded Trinamool Congress (TMC) spokesperson Saket Gokhale to two-day police custody after he was arrested by Gujarat Police. The former ‘RTI activist’ was arrested over his tweet endorsing a fake news report about Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Morbi visit.
Gokhale was apprehended in the early hours of Tuesday morning in Jaipur, Rajasthan, by officials from the Ahmedabad Cyber Crime Cell and brought to Ahmedabad in the afternoon, where he was formally arrested.
Gokhale had shared a fabricated news report about an RTI query and its response that does not exist. He had claimed that ₹30 crore was spent on PM Modi’s Morbi visit, sharing a news clipping from an unnamed Gujarati newspaper, which was claimed to be Gujarat Samachar. But BJP has said that it is fabricated and no such report was published and there is no such RTI reply, and Gujarat Samachar also clarified that they have not published such a report.
