Rahul stands by RSS remark, ready to face trial

Meanwhile, the top Courtrefused to grant theCongressvice-president exemption from personal appearance before lower Courtin the defamation case.

Kunte said he filed the petition on March 18, 2014 referring to Rahul’s speech at an election rally in Bhiwandi on March 6 that year where he said “the RSS killed Gandhiji”.

The bench also said the trial court would go into the case without being influenced by any of the observations made by the apex court and the High Court during the various hearings before them. I stand by my every word. Another Party leader Kapil Sibal said there is no U turn by Mr Gandhi in the entire case.

“Whenever and wherever there is an election, RSS is maligned”, he said.

Senior counsel UR Lalit appeared for the respondent, RSS activist Rajesh Mahadev Kunte who had filed the complaint alleging defamation.

It was noted in the last hearing that since Gandhi in his affidavit before the high court had blamed the people associated with RSS and not the RSS itself as an organization for the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, the matter could rest in the criminal defamation case.

In what is being seen as yet another U-turn, Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday dramatically declared that he would rather face trial in the Maharashtra court than withdraw or amend his remarks that people of RSS background were behind Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination.

The timing of Rahul’s decision to stand his ground on the RSS issue and face trial is significant. With UP, Punjab and other crucial assembly elections around the corner, Congress felt such a battle could push the BJP on the back foot by raising the issue of who is a true Indian – the one that killed Mahatma Gandhi or the ones glorifying his killer. I only said what Nathuram Godse’s brother Gopal Godse said. “It is not an attempt to appropriate the legacy of RSS”, Rahul Gandhi is said to have clarified in his affidavit filed earlier and referred to by the apex court on 24 August.

“‘Rsske logon ne hatya ki” is entirely different from “Rss had killed Mahatma Gandhi”, Sibbal had told the apex court.

Finally, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi has come out of his boyish stature to step into bigger shoes of owning something he had said and facing the brunt of it even in terms of a Court trial and then jail, if need be.