New Delhi: The Supreme Court Thursday dismissed a gang rape case against the ruling Congress party general-secretary Rahul Gandhi.
The Supreme Court bench of Justices B.S. Chauhan and Swatanter Kumar said that the allegation against Rahul Gandhi and his friends were fake.
“The allegation is without substance and without an iota of evidence,” the judges said.
The apex court imposed a fine of Rs1 million (Dh69,591) on petitioner Kishore Samrite which is to be equally distributed between Gandhi and family of the girl who was supposed to be the victim of the fake rape case.
The court ruled that the lawsuit had damaged the public image of Rahul Gandhi and that of his family.
Samrite, a former Uttar Pradesh legislator belonging to the Samajwadi Party, had moved to the Allahabad High Court accusing Gandhi and his friends of wrongful confinement and gang rape of the girl at a guest house where Gandhi was staying during his visit to his parliamentary constituency Amethi on December 3, 2006.
He had used report on a website operated from abroad to frame Gandhi, son of ruling Congress party chief Sonia Gandhi.
The Allahabad High Court earlier dismissed the case and imposed a fine of Rs5 million on the petitioner.
The Supreme Court had earlier asked the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to probe the allegation.
The CBI is learnt to have reported that there was no substance in the allegation, which was meant to politically damage the Congress general secretary and his family and had hinted that Smrite had received funds from abroad to frame the Gandhi-Nehru family scion in a criminal case.
The Supreme Court asked the CBI to continue its investigation against Samrite.
The verdict has come as a big relief to the Gandhi family and the party as an adverse ruling would have further damaged changes of the Congress party-led ruling coalition to retain power in the 2014 parliamentary elections.
