High Court extends stay on defamation case proceedings against Sisir Adhikari

Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court is learnt to have further extended the stay on the proceedings in the defamation case filed by TMC leader Kunal Ghosh against his party’s former MP Sisir Adhikari.

It was learnt that the court has ordered that the trial of the defamation case in the Metropolitan Magistrate Court of Kolkata will remain in abeyance till September 30. The next hearing of this case is scheduled to be held on the 24 of that month.

Kunal Ghosh had filed a defamation suit against Sisir Adhikari for which the latter was summoned by the Metropolitan Magistrate Court of Kolkata this January. Adhikari had challenged it in the high court which had then stayed the proceedings of the lower court in February. This stay was further extended by the high court presently.

The altercation between Ghosh and Adhikari reportedly finds its genesis in a comment made by Ghosh regarding an alleged sudden increase in wealth of Adhikari.

Ghosh had questioned the affidavit submitted by Sisir Adhikari with the Election Commission in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections.

Ghosh had alleged that according to the affidavit, Adhikari had declared he possessed assets worth Rs 10 lakh but when he became a Union minister of State during the Manmohan Singh government, he had submitted an affidavit in the Prime Minister’s Office where he declared he owned assets worth Rs 10 crore.

Then again in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Adhikari allegedly declared he possessed assets worth Rs 3 crore in his affidavit. Ghosh had demanded a probe into this discrepancy. Adhikari in turn had allegedly called Ghosh a convict.