The Madras High Court on Wednesday quashed criminal defamation proceedings initiated against eight Tamil actors, including Suriya and Sarathkumar, pending in the file of a trial court in the Nilgiris.
Justice M.V. Muralidharan passed the order on the quash petition moved by Suriya, Sarathkumar, Sathyaraj, Vivekh, Arun Vijay, Sri Priya, Cheran and Vijay Kumar.
The issue pertains to a complaint filed by Rozario Maria Soosai of Udhagamandalam against the eight actors under Section 499 (criminal defamation) of the IPC for allegedly making statements degrading the reputation of a leading Tamil news daily and a journalist attached to it on October 7, 2009, during a meeting of the South Indian Film Artistes Association.
In 2011, the eight actors approached the High Court and obtained a stay against the proceedings of the case. But since the actors or their counsel failed to represent the case continuously, on March 14 this year the High Court dismissed the original plea and consequently the stay on proceedings was also vacated.
Since the plea moved by the actors in the High Court was dismissed for default, the trial court restored the proceedings and summoned appearance of the actors. As they failed to appear, the trial court on May 24 issued non-bailable warrants against them.
Once again, the actors approached the High Court and obtained an interim stay against the operation of the warrant. Meanwhile, they also moved a restoration petition to restore the original case which was dismissed for default. Allowing the restoration of the original case, the judge passed the order on Wednesday.