Ten months into the cross-examination, complainant Satyaki Savarkar has told a Pune court that Rahul Gandhi’s Cross-Examination Amounts To Surveillance, alleging that the defence is prolonging the criminal defamation trial with questions on his private life. His contentions have not been adjudicated.
Pune: Alleging that the questions put to him in the witness box have become a roving and fishing inquiry into his personal life, Satyaki Savarkar, the complainant in the criminal defamation case against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his remarks on VD Savarkar, has filed an objection before a Pune court. He says the line of questioning amounts to surveillance and is prolonging the trial [Satyaki Savarkar v. Rahul Gandhi].
The objection was filed on October 14 before the Special MP/MLA Court in Pune, where Advocate Sangram Kolhatkar appears for Savarkar and Advocate Milind Pawar for Gandhi. The matter is next listed on October 28. What follows are the complainant’s contentions, and none has been adjudicated.
What the objection says
According to Savarkar, the cross-examination has gone on for more than ten months and the defence has given no definite timeframe for finishing it. He contends that questions about his daily routine, his publishing business and the public and cultural events he attends infringe his fundamental rights and leave him afraid of being followed. He adds that he has never probed Gandhi’s personal movements, foreign visits or private engagements.
He also contends that unrelated political and cultural organisations are being drawn into the trial so as to politicise it, and warns that the proceedings will drag on and never end.
The complaint behind the objection
The case stems from remarks Gandhi made at a gathering in the United Kingdom in March 2023. Savarkar, who is the grandnephew of VD Savarkar, alleges that Gandhi said VD Savarkar had written in his memoirs of an incident in which he and others assaulted a Muslim man and took pleasure in it. Savarkar maintains that no such incident appears in VD Savarkar’s published works. He filed a complaint for criminal defamation under Section 500 of the IPC and also seeks compensation under Section 357 of the CrPC.
Earlier, on July 30, Savarkar had applied for a strict timeline and tighter control over the cross-examination. Judicial Magistrate First Class Amol Shinde issued notice on August 4 seeking Gandhi’s reply, which is still pending.
Where the defence stands
No written response to the new objection has been filed on Gandhi’s behalf, and the reply to Savarkar’s earlier application remains pending before the Magistrate. Cross-examination is the accused’s statutory means of testing a complainant’s evidence, and it is for the court to decide which questions are relevant and how the examination should proceed.
A question of limits
Two interests meet in this objection: the accused’s right to test a witness’s account in full, and a witness’s claim to be spared questioning that strays from the issues in the case. Where the court draws that line will bear on the pace of a trial in which cross-examination has already run past ten months.
Neither the objection nor the earlier application has been ruled upon so far, and no view is expressed on the merits of the defamation complaint.
Case Title: Satyaki Savarkar v. Rahul Gandhi (case number not available)
Court: Special MP/MLA Court, Pune
Date of Filing: October 14, 2026
Appearances: Advocate Sangram Kolhatkar for the complainant; Advocate Milind Pawar for the accused