New Delhi: No foreign diplomat has raised with him the matter of Rahul Gandhi being disqualified from Lok Sabha, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Wednesday. He said that Rahul getting disqualified was the outcome of a law the Congress leader himself supported in the past, PTI reported.
Speaking at Network18's Rising India Summit, the minister said that Rahul was disqualified because he did not regret issuing "disparaging" comments against a community in public.
He said, "The law is the law unless somebody thinks that the law is not for them."
"Four years ago, Rahul Gandhi was disparaging a community in a public meeting. It is on public record. A member of that community took offence and began legal proceedings," S Jaishankar explained how he explained the issue to his counterparts abroad.
The external affairs minister said Mr Gandhi had an opportunity to rectify the situation by expressing regret but chose not to do so.
"The legal process produced an outcome. The outcome triggered a law, which Rahul Gandhi had himself supported some years ago," he said, referring to the verdict of a Gujarat court sentencing the Congress leader to a two-year jail term in a defamation case.
He claimed that the law had been applied to 10-12 elected representatives, including BJP.
As per Section 8(3) of the Representation of the Peoples Act, a person convicted of any offence and sentenced to imprisonment for not less than two years shall be disqualified. The disqualification, as per the Act, shall begin on the date of the conviction and continue for a period of six years after his release.
If Rahul's conviction does not get stayed by an appellate court, his disqualification will continue for a total of eight years. This includes two years of imprisonment and six years after release.