The Madras High Court on Tuesday, December 5, 2023, quashed a criminal defamation case filed by Murasoli Trust against against Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) leader S. Ramadoss for his 2019 tweet alleging that the trust was squatting on Panchami land meant for the Scheduled Caste people.
Justice G.K. Ilanthiraiyan allowed a quash petition filed by Mr. Ramadoss in 2020 and set aside the criminal defamation case pending against him before a Metropolitan Magistrate Court at Egmore in Chennai. The judge had in 2020 itself stayed all further proceedings in the case.
In an affidavit filed through his counsel K. Balu, Mr. Ramadoss had stated incumbent Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, also the Managing Trustee of Murasoli Trust, had watched a Tamil movie titled Asuran, based on travails faced by the Scheduled Castes, in 2019 and tweeted that it was not just a movie but a lesson to be learnt by all.
Responding to it, Mr. Ramadoss tweeted back stating that it was the trust which should first learn a lesson from the movie and return the Panchami land on which it was reportedly squatting for long. “This, by no stretch of imagination, would amount to defamation,” Mr. Balu had contended before the High Court.
