The Supreme Court has indicated that the defamation case against Congress MP Shashi Tharoor over his 2018 'scorpion sitting on a Shivling' remark about Prime Minister Narendra Modi should be brought to a close. Speaking on this, Tharoor clarified that he was quoting a published article from 2011 and not targeting anyone personally. The BJP leader who filed the case was urged to reconsider pursuing what the court sees as a politically motivated and frivolous case. Watch Tharoor's response.
00:00Look, I mean, I wasn't targeting Prime Minister Modi, I was not targeting any individual.
00:05I had written a book in which I quoted an article published in 2011,
00:11which in turn quoted a statement by an individual in those days in the RSS
00:16who subsequently was rehabilitated by the BJP and has served as the prabhadi of the BJP in Eastern UP.
00:25So the person who said it, there's no case against him.
00:28The person who quoted it in print in 2011, there is no case against him.
00:34But me, for six years later, quoting the quote in a book, there's a case against me.
00:40I mean, this makes no sense at all.
00:42So we have been trying to get the case dismissed because all I'm doing is I'm writing a detailed book full of footnotes.
00:49And in a footnote, I've said this is the source, an article in the Caravan magazine quoting a then-unnamed RSS person,
00:55but he's no longer unnamed because his video is all over the internet saying this.
00:59It's not my sentence.
01:00I'm quoting a quote, and yet there has been a case filed against me.
01:04So I think it's not surprising that the court said, why do you want to be like, why did you drop the case?
01:09But they're not willing to drop the case, it seems.
01:11Some of these things are dragged on.
01:13As I was saying during this discussion, part of the problem in our system is too many frivolous cases are allowed to function.
01:19And as a result, the process itself becomes a punishment.
01:23At the end of the day, this has dragged on for so many years.
01:27My book was published in 2017.
01:29This is now 2025.
01:31And this is dragging on and on.
01:32Half the time, the companion doesn't come to the court.
01:35It's adjourned.
01:35It prolongs.
01:36I honestly think that one of the things we all have to think about in our country is, is the judiciary's time always being well spent on worthwhile cases?
01:44Or are a lot of our judges wasting a lot of time on frivolous complaints, which are done often for political motives?
01:53I remember one case against me was dismissed by a judge in the Delhi High Court, describing it as a political interest litigation, a different kind of PIL.
02:00There is a lot of political interest cases, unfortunately, and this is one of them.
02:04Look, I mean, I wasn't targeting Prime Minister Modi.
02:07I was not targeting any individual.
02:09I had written a book in which I quoted an article published in 2011, which in turn quoted a statement by an individual in those days in the RSS,
02:22who subsequently was rehabilitated by the BJP and has served as the prabhari of the BJP in Eastern UP.
02:30So the person who said it, there is no case against it.
02:33The person who quoted it in print in 2011, there is no case against him.
02:38But me, for six years later, quoting the quote in a book, there's a case against me.
02:44I mean, this makes no sense at all.
02:46So we have been trying to get the case dismissed because all I'm doing is I'm writing a detailed book full of footnotes.
02:53And in a footnote, I've said this is the source, an article in the Caravan magazine quoting the then unnamed RSS person.
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