New Delhi, Aug 29: The Delhi High Court on Thursday refused to quash a defamation case filed against Congress parliamentarian Shashi Tharoor over his "scorpion sitting on a Shivling" remark made allegedly in relation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

A bench of Justice Anoop Kumar Mendiratta dismissed Tharoor's plea for quashing the criminal defamation case filed by BJP leader Rajiv Babbar.

Asking the parties to appear before the trial court on September 10, the Delhi HC vacated its earlier interim order staying the proceedings pending before the lower court.

Babbar instituted the case against Tharoor over the latter's 'scorpion' remark vis-a-vis PM Modi made in 2018 at the Bengaluru Literature Festival. In his complaint, Babbar alleged that his religious sentiments were hurt by Tharoor's statement. The BJP leader claimed that the senior Congress leader completely disregarded the sentiments of crores of Shiva devotees by insulting their religious beliefs and filed a complaint under Sections 499 and 500 of the now-repealed Indian Penal Code (IPC).

After Tharoor was summoned by the trial court for allegedly committing an offence under Section 500 of the IPC, he moved the Delhi High Court contending that the summons order was "bad in law" and "against the principles of criminal jurisprudence". In his plea, Tharoor said that he did not make any false opinion or comments and rather only quoted a direct statement from an already published piece of journalistic work, adding that “a fair comment or honest opinion cannot be considered as defamation or libel".

Issuing notice, the Delhi HC, in October 2020, ordered an interim stay on trial proceedings and sought the defendant's reply to Tharoor's plea for quashing the criminal defamation. Before this, a Delhi court imposed a fine of Rs 5,000 on Tharoor over his repeated non-appearance and strongly directed him to appear before it on the next date of hearing. With the dismissal of Tharoor's plea by the Delhi HC, the senior Congress leader will now have to face trial proceedings.

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