New Delhi, Dec 12 (IANS) Congress spokesperson and Chairman of the party’s Media and Publicity department Pawan Khera on Friday kicked up a storm by claiming that someone in the “the highest office” helped a businessman acquire a real-estate-rich media company for “peanuts”, a comment which invited a Rs 100 crore defamation notice.

Khera’s early morning social media post did not name any organisation but mentioned the name of R.P. Gupta who had recently taken over the management of news agency, UNI.

United News of India (UNI) was founded in 1959 and has its Delhi headquarters at a multi-acre British era bungalow on Rafi Marg in the heart of the national capital – adjacent to the Ministry of Telecommunications and just above Patel Chowk Metro station.

After Khera’s stinging social media post, a fuming Gupta served Khera with a defamation notice of Rs 100 crore for his “false, cowardly, and anti-national” statements on X.

The notice was served by Gupta in his capacity as Chairman of The Statesman Ltd and Director of UNI, through his lawyer Praveen Kumar.

The notice demanded a retraction, an apology and a written undertaking from the Congress Spokesperson to desist from repeating the defamatory allegations that also lowered the dignity of The President and the judiciary.

Gupta’s lawyer stated: “Should you fail to comply with the terms state, I have instructions to proceed against you, both under civil and criminal law and you shall also be liable for damages to the tune of Rs 100 Crore which shall be recoverable from you at your risk and cost.”

Khera is not new to controversies. Earlier, he invited trouble for alleged defamatory comments about Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s father and linking the PM to industrialists.

The notice issued by Gupta’s lawyer said: “My client’s attention has been drawn to a tweet posted by you today… wherein apparently for your own narrow political ends, you have intentionally uttered lies aimed at defaming my client by making the following false, cowardly, and anti-national statements that display contempt towards the country’s highest office and our great Indian Judiciary.”

The notice said: “The tweet is as follows: Who is RP Gupta? Did someone in the highest office of the country help him acquire a real-estate-rich media company for peanuts? Who is the real owner of the said company?”

Gupta’s lawyer said in the notice: “The questions posed by you in the aforesaid social media post are nothing but bare-faced lies dressed up as innuendo with the sole objective of defaming my client, and lowering his prestige in the eyes of his peers/friends/employees/media houses and members of society.”

The notice said that soon after Khera’s message on social media, Gupta was subjected to mental agony.

“Immediately after this tweet was placed in the public domain by you, my client received several calls from his friends and well-wishers in the media and elsewhere expressing shock and horror at the baseless and false insinuations made by you,” said the notice.

Gupta’s notice to the Congress leader said, “Your insinuation that the acquisition of a “real-estate-rich media company for peanuts” was aided and abetted by the highest office of the country mocks and brings into ridicule not just H.E. The President of the republic, but the judicial process by which this acquisition took place after going through a transparent and vigorous public resolution process lasting almost two years…”

–IANS

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