NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has stayed the conviction of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in the defamation case. With this, Rahul Gandhi will be reinstated as MP. It was the bench comprising Justices BR Gavai, PS Narasimha, and Sanjay Kumar who considered the appeal of Rahul Gandhi.

The court also said that the trial court should explain why Rahul was given the maximum punishment in the defamation case. The hearing in the case lasted for more than one and a half hours.

Advocate Manu Abhishek Singhvi, who appeared for Rahul Gandhi, said that Rahul had not insulted the Modi community and that the complainant was a BJP member.

On the other hand, senior advocate Jethamalani, appearing for the complainant BJP MLA in the defamation case, said that Gandhi’s intention was to defame every person with the surname ‘Modi’ just because it is the same as that of a Prime Minister.

"Rahul Gandhi defamed an entire class out of malice,” he said. He also referred to the admonition awarded to Gandhi by the Supreme Court in 2019 in contempt proceedings over his remarks on the Rafale case.

On July 15, the Congress leader had approached the Supreme Court challenging the Gujarat high court’s order where a bench of Justice Hemant Prachchhak had observed that granting a stay on his conviction would be an exception, and not a rule. Gandhi was disqualified as an MP in March, after a Surat court convicted him and sentenced him to two years in prison for his "How come all thieves have Modi as the common surname" remark made during an election rally in Karnataka in April 2019.