Rahul stands by RSS remark, ready to face trial

Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday said before the Supreme Court that he stood by his words that people from RSS had killed Mahatma Gandhi.

Rahul also said he was ready to face trial for his statement made in March 2014. “I will not take back my words. I stood by it yesterday, I stand by it today and I will stand by it in future. I am ready to face trial,” Rahul’s counsel Kapil Sibal along with senior advocate Mahalakshmi Pavani told the court.

A bench of Justices Dipak Misra and Rohinton Fali Nariman allowed Rahul to withdraw his petition challenging the defamation proceedings initiated in a Bhiwandi court on a complaint by RSS worker Rajesh Kunte.

The court, however, declined his request for exemption from



personal appearance in the trial court. On August 24, Rahul had agreed to state “unequivocally” before the court that he never accused RSS of Gandhi’s assassination.

The court had then asked Kunte’s counsel to clarify if he was ready to accept Rahul’s statement.

In response, senior advocate U R Lalit, representing Kunte, on Thursday submitted that Rahul made his statement before the court for “convenience of litigation only”. His target is RSS as nobody is saying anything about Nathuram Godse, he said.  “The situation is otherwise. Let him prove his bona fide,” Lalit said, adding, “We (RSS) are maligned whenever an election is around the corner. The Congress has made capital out of it for the last six decades.”