[dropcap]C[/dropcap]ONGRESS President Rahul Gandhi has tendered an unconditional apology for “the wrongful attribution” of the phrase chowkidar hi chor hai to the Supreme Court of India.
Asserting that he holds the Supreme Court in the highest esteem and that he would never directly or indirectly, “commit any act that interferes with the process of administration of justice”, Gandhi said in an affidavit filed with the apex court that the attributions were entirely “unintentional, non-wilful and inadvertent”.
The affidavit was in response to a criminal contempt petition filed by Bharatiya Janata Party leader Meenakshi Lekhi.
Background of case
Lekhi, a Lok Sabha MP, filed the petition against the Congress President in the Supreme Court on April 12, 2019, alleging that the latter had deliberately misrepresented that the judges had in their April 10 Rafale judgement used the phrase “Chowkidar hi chor hai” while referring to the Prime Minster.
Gandhi had on April 22, 2019 filed a reply in the Supreme Court regretting his remark, but the Court, while accepting the submission of his lawyer, Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, had on April 23, 2019 gone on to issue a criminal contempt notice to Congress Party leader.
