The Adani Group will withdraw all defamation suits against The Wire and its editors in an Ahmedabad court, according to IANS.
However, senior counsel for Adani Group, SV Raju, told Ahmedabad Mirror that he was not aware of the development.
This development comes just days after Anil Ambani-led Reliance Group announced that it would be withdrawing the Rs 5,000 crore civil defamation suit against Congress leaders and newspaper National Herald over their statements and reports in relation to the Rafale deal.
Adani Group Moves To Withdraw Cases
The lawsuit named founder-editors Siddharth Varadarajan and MK Venu, along with Siddharth Bhatia, Monobina Gupta, Pamela Philipose and Noor Mohammed.
Siddharth Varadarajan told IANS, “We understand that the Adani Group has moved to withdraw all the defamation cases, civil and criminal, instituted against The Wire over the past two years for various articles we have published on the Group’s businesses. We will issue a statement once this process attains finality.”
My quote to IANS—We understand the Adani Group has moved to withdraw all defamation cases, civil and criminal, instituted against The Wire over the years for various articles we’ve published on the Group’s businesses. We will issue a statement once this process attains finality. https://t.co/5WVVYuvwwh
— Siddharth (@svaradarajan) May 22, 2019
On November 11, 2017, The Wire had published an article titled, “Does It Make Economic Sense For IOC and Gail India To Invest In Adani’s LNG Terminals?”. The Adani Group had slapped a Rs 100 crore defamation against the news portal soon after. The group had sought an injunction against raising questions in this regard.
Earlier in June 2017, Adani Group had filed another defamation suit against The Wire and Economic and Political Weekly over an article titled, “Modi Government’s Rs 500 crore Bonanza to the Adani Group”. This article was first published by Economic and Political Weekly and then reproduced by The Wire. While Economic and Political Weekly took the article down, The Wire continued to host it. However, the Adani Group lost the defamation case it had filed. Additional Sessions judge NR Joshi said that the summoning order passed against web portal “lacked any cogent reasoning”.
Reliance Group Withdraws Defamation Suit
The Reliance Group led by Anil Ambani withdrew the Rs 5,000 crore defamation suit it had filed against Congress leaders and newspaper National Herald.
The company said that the article titled “Anil Ambani Floated Reliance Defence 10 Days Before Modi Announced Rafale Deal” in National Herald had caused ‘considerable damage’ to the company’s image. The civil defamation case was also filed against Congress leaders Sunil Jakhar, Randeep Singh Surjewala, Oommen Chandy, Ashok Chavan, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Sanjay Nirupam and Shaktisinh Gohil.
Also Read: Adani Loses Defamation Case Against The Wire & Economic And Political Weekly
