“RELATIVES OF DECEASED CAN FILE DEFAMATION SUIT” -PUNJAB AND HARYANA HC

“RELATIVES OF DECEASED CAN FILE DEFAMATION SUIT”

-PUNJAB AND HARYANA HC

  7TH DECEMBER 2020

The Hon’ble  Punjab and Haryana High Court has held that the personal interest is the important ingredient of an aggrieved person in case of Defamation Complaint . The High Court observed that the complainant should either be the person defamed or a family member or near relative in case of a deceased person. This observation was made while hearing a Petition filed under Section 482 Code of Criminal Procedure, seeking quashing of Complaint dated April 18, 2018 ‘Sant Kanwar V/s. Raj Kumar Saini’, under Sections 499, 500 and 501 of Indian Penal Code, which was filed before the Judicial Magistrate First Class, Rohtak.

The high court further observed that only the ‘family members’ or ‘near relatives’ of the deceased person, against whom imputations have been made, can claim to be ‘persons aggrieved’ to file defamation complaints under Section 499 of the IPC.