A criminal defamation complaint has been filed against former cricketer and suspended BJP leader Kirti Azad in a trial court for his alleged “defamatory” and “false” remarks against
Delhi-based cricketer Himmat Singh and Himmat’s father Tejbir Singh.
Tejbir filed a complaint against Azad and three other former cricketers — including Bishan Singh Bedi, Surinder Khanna and Sameer Bahadur — at Patiala House Courts, claiming that the four made baseless allegations against his son Himmat that Himmat was selected in a cricket tournament after he gave a bribe of Rs25 lakh.
The court has fixed January 4 for hearing the matter. Kirti Azad, who has been in news lately for his statements against Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and corruption in Delhi’s cricket body Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA), was sacked by BJP on Wednesday.
Seeking action against the four accused, Tejbir said he and his son have been “unnecessarily” dragged into the controversy over the DDCA issue. The complaint was filed under section 499,500 of the IPC
for the alleged offence of defamation.
“During the DDCA controversy, the former cricketers jointly and severally conducted certain Press conferences while releasing their version of the controversies, have intentionally and with imputed that Himmat Singh has been wrongly selected for one of the important tournament (Vijay Hazare Trophy) and there has been an exchange of Rs25 lakhs for his selection, which they said was paid by Himmat’s father.” Tejbir alleged in his complaint.
Tejbir said that the “baseless” and “concocted” story of the four accused persons caused “immense damage” to Himmat and their family. “False and defamatory statements regarding the exchange of Rs25 lakh for selection of the complainant’s son, Himmat Singh for some tournament ie. Vijay Hazare Trophy, is concocted per se and the same are not only false but false to the knowledge of the accused(s) jointly and severally,” alleged Tejbir.
The complainant also claimed that he has sufficient evidence against the former cricketers to prove his case beyond reasonable doubt. Himmat has been a captain of the under 19 Indian cricket team. “Besides damaging the moral of an upcoming sportsman of young age, such an act has resulted into defamation of the complainant and his son. Such slanderous statements inspired by malicious falsehood as made by the accused no.1 and accused no.2, 3 & 4 in connivance with each other have caused serious damage to the clean image and of the complainant and his family,” the complaint said.