New Delhi, Apr 6: The Supreme Court today issued notice to Rahul Gandhi, UP government and four others on a petition filed by a former MLA challenging Rs 50 lakh fine slapped on him by the Allahabad High Court in an alleged sexual exploitation case.
A bench of justices V S Sirpurkar and T S Thakur while staying the high court order, which had also directed a CBI probe against the former legislator, asked the respondents to file their replies within four weeks.
Former Samajwadi Party MLA from Madhya Pradesh Kishore Samrite had challenged the high court order, saying it was illegal and arbitrary and issued without application of mind.
The Lucknow Bench of Allahabad High Court had last month slapped a penalty of Rs 50 lakh on Samrite who had moved a habeas corpus petition against Rahul alleging he had kept in captivity a girl and her parents, which later turned out to be false.
The high court passed the order after the girl, Sukanya, who according to the petitioner was held captive by Rahul, denied any such incident when she was produced in court.
Samrite had alleged that Sukanya and her parents were held captive by Rahul and sought directions to the police for producing them in court.
A similar petition was filed by Gajendra Pal Singh, who claimed to be a relative of Sukanya, after which the court ordered the DGP to produce the girl and her parents before it.
The girl told the court that her actual name is Kirti Singh and that Balram Singh and Sushila are her parents and their identification was done by in charge of Amethi police station.
Kirti told the court that neither she nor her parents were under illegal detention of any person nor has she any information regarding the news item being displayed by the website.
On the basis of deposition made by Kirti, the court imposed the hefty cost on the petitioner and taking suo moto cognisance of an effort to defame a high profile personality, ordered a CBI probe. PTI
