Rahul Gandhi to move sessions court today against conviction

NEW DELHI: Disqualified Congress MP Rahul Gandhi will be at the Surat district sessions court Monday to appeal his March 23 conviction. Congress MP and lawyer Abhishek Manu Singhvi is overseeing Rahul's legal response while senior advocate R S Cheema has been assigned the responsibility of filing the appeal, sources in New Delhi said.
In the event of a higher bench not setting aside Rahul's conviction by the court of Surat chief judicial magistrate H H Varma, he can't contest elections for eight years. The six-year bar for any MLA or MP jailed for two years and above kicks in after the completion of the sentence.

Immediately after sentencing him, the CJM's court had given Rahul bail and suspended his sentence for 30 days so that he could appeal. CJM Varma said the quantum of the sentence, pronounced under Section 500 of the IPC, was in keeping with the "gravity" of the offence for which Rahul had been convicted.
"If the accused is given less punishment, it sends a wrong message to the public and the purpose of defamation is not served and anybody will easily slander someone," the court said, referring to the SC previously asking Rahul to show restraint in future after he had to apologise for his "chowkidar chor hai" remark. Rahul was disqualified from the LS the very next day after his conviction.
Watch Rahul Gandhi to appeal against conviction in Surat court on April 3