MeToo: Judge hearing M J Akbar's defamation case against Ramani seeks transfer of case
New Delhi: After hearing for two years, a court of Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Tuesday asked the District Judge to transfer the criminal defamation complaint of former union minister M J Akbar against journalist Priya Ramani to another judge on the ground that the court was designated to hear cases filed against lawmakers.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (ACMM) Vishal Pahuja, who had started the final arguments in the case on February 7 this year, said the case in hand is not filed against MP or MLA and needs to be transferred to the "Competent Court of Jurisdiction".
Pahuja said his court (court of ACMM) was designated to try the cases filed against the lawmakers by a circular passed on February 23, 2018, and since this case was not filed against MP/MLA, he was marking the matter to Principal District and Sessions Judge to consider re-assigning the case to another Metropolitan Magistrate.
Akbar had filed the criminal defamation complaint against Ramani in March 2018.
If transferred before another court, the judge would start hearing the final arguments again.
As the present matter is not filed against MP/MLA, hence, cannot be tried by this court and needs to be transferred to the Competent Court of Jurisdiction.
Let this matter be put up before the court of Principal District and Sessions Judge (Rouse Avenue District Courts) for October 14 for further appropriate orders, the ACMM said.
In the wake of the #MeToo movement, Ramani in 2018 accused Akbar of sexual misconduct around 20 years ago when he was a journalist.
Akbar resigned as Union minister on October 17, 2018.
Ramani had earlier told the court that she was targeted selectively through a criminal defamation complaint by Akbar, to halt the avalanche of allegations of sexual misconduct that came out against him in the wake of the #MeToo movement in 2008.
Akbar had earlier told the court that Ramani had defamed him by calling him with adjectives such as 'media's biggest predator' that harmed his reputation.
He has denied all the allegations of sexual harassment against the women who came forward during the #MeToo campaign against him.
Akbar had earlier told the court that the allegations made in an article in the 'Vogue' and the subsequent tweets were defamatory on the face of it as the complainant had deposed them to be false and imaginary and that immediate damage was caused to him due to the false allegations by Ramani.
Ramani had earlier told the court that her disclosure of alleged sexual harassment by Akbar has come at a great personal cost and she had nothing to gain from it.
She had said her move would empower women to speak up and make them understand their rights in the workplace.
Several women came up with accounts of the alleged sexual harassment by Akbar while they were working as journalists under him.
He has termed the allegations false, fabricated, and deeply distressing and said he was taking appropriate legal action against them.
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Man arrested with Rs 2.54-crore heroin in Mumbai
Mumbai (PTI): Police have arrested a man and seized over 500 grams of heroin worth Rs 2.54 crore in the illicit market from him in Mumbai, officials said on Friday.
The police's Anti-Narcotics Cell (ANC) made the drug seizure in Santacruz in the western suburbs. The operation was conducted by the Kandivali unit of the ANC on Thursday as part of a special crackdown against drug trafficking in the area, they said.
Acting on specific inputs, an ANC team conducted a raid in Santacruz (East) and intercepted a man. During a search, the team recovered 508 grams of high-grade heroin from his possession, an official said.
The seized contraband, a highly addictive, opioid drug derived from morphine, is estimated to be worth Rs 2.54 crore in the international market, he informed.
Following the seizure, a case was registered against the man under relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985, and he was formally placed under arrest in the early hours of Friday.
The police are currently investigating the source of the drug and trying to identify the intended recipients of the consignment, he said.
