"You Added Spice": Kangana Ranaut's Plea Over Defamation Case Dismissed

The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to entertain Bollywood actor and Lok Sabha MP Kangana Ranaut's plea seeking quashing of a criminal defamation case filed against her by Mahinder Kaur, an elderly woman who was part of the farmers' protest in 2021.

A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta heard the matter and dismissed the plea as withdrawn. During the hearing, when Kangana's counsel argued that the defamation complaint had not been filed against the original tweet but against her for retweeting it, Justice Vikram Nath said, "You not only retweeted, you added spice to it."

The court further told her counsel, "If we say anything more, it will go against your trial only."

Ms Ranaut, who is the Member of Parliament from Mandi in Himachal Pradesh, had been accused of defamation by 73-year-old Mahinder Kaur, from Punjab's Bathinda district, who had taken part in the protests.

The actor had said Ms Kaur was the same "dadi" (grandmother) named Bilkis Bano, who was part of the Shaheen Bagh protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC), and had also made a "Rs 100" reference. 

Dismissing Ms Ranaut's petition on August 1, a single-judge bench of Justice Tribhuvan Dahiya of the Punjab and Haryana High Court had observed there was no evidence to show that her statement supporting a post on X was made in good faith or for the public good.

"...There is no substance in the next submission by learned counsel for the petitioner that the retweet was in good faith, and in the absence of mens rea (malice) she was entitled to the benefit of the Ninth and Tenth Exception to Section 499 IPC," Justice Dahiya had said. 

Ms Kaur said she had been part of the protests against the farm laws, which were later repealed, since the beginning and had no connection with the woman from Shaheen Bagh, who had also been featured in Time Magazine.

Ms Ranaut, she had said in her complaint had, made "false imputation and defamatory remarks against the complainant, hurting her pride, honour, and defaming her on social media".