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Synopsis

The Madras High Court has again said "no" to BJP leader H Raja's plea to quash the FIR against him. Raja is accused of making derogatory remarks about former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K Karunanidhi and his daughter Kanimozhi Karunanidhi.

Earlier, Raja had approached the high court to quash the case against him, however, vide, order dated August 29, 2023, the plea was dismissed by the court directing the Special Court for MP/MLA Cases, to complete the proceedings, within a period of three months.

Since the trial is still ongoing, Raja filed the present petition to quash the complaint taken cognizance by the trial court for the offence under Sections 153, 504 and 509 of IPC.

The bench of Justice G Jayachandran noted that the present petition was purely on factual aspects or the grounds, which were already canvassed in the earlier quash petition. Court also noted that out of 7 witnesses, four witnesses have already been examined.

Hence, the single judge bench found no merit in this fresh petition and accordingly, dismissed the same. 

The earlier quash petition was dismissed by the bench of Justice N Anand Venkatesh who had said that Raja has "the proclivity to make irresponsible and damaging comments and that is the reason why he gets into trouble".

Justice Venkatesh had passed the same order in three different petitions filed by Raja to quash a total of 11 cases.

Regarding the case against Raja for his tweet dated April 18, 2018, on Ex-CM M Karunanidhi and his daughter Kanimozhi where he had characterised Kanimozhi as an illegitimate child, Justice Venkatesh had said that Raja's tweet bordered on hate speech.

Case Title: H.Raja v. State and Another