The Saket Court in Delhi summoned YouTuber Dhruv Rathee in a defamation case. Suresh Karamshi Nakhua, BJP Spokesperson in Mumbai submitted the case. After Rathee allegedly referred to him as a “violent and abusive” troll in one of his most recent videos.
On July 7, 2024, Rathee uploaded a video to his YouTube channel titled “My Reply To Godi YouTubers Elvish Yadav Dhruv Rathee.” Nakhua claimed Rathee called him a “violent and abusive troll” without explanation. He went on to add that as a result of Rathee’s charges, he had received widespread criticism and contempt.
In a decision dated July 19, 2024, District Judge Gunjan Gupta summoned Dhruv Rathee and social media middlemen on August 6. Advocates Raghav Awasthi and Mukesh Sharma represented the BJP leader. The BJP spokesperson stated, “That the defendant No. 1 (Dhruv Rathee), in a highly provocative and incendiary video that spread like wildfire across digital channels, made bold and baseless charges against the plaintiff (Nakhua). The sinister goal underlying this film is the baseless impression that the plaintiff is somehow tied to violent and abusive troll operations.”
As of now, the video has 17,766,153 views and 1.7 million likes. According to Nakhua’s lawsuit against Rathee, the YouTuber attempted to “tarnish his hard-earned standing in society” and “planted seeds of mistrust and suspicion that can have far-reaching consequences.” Furthermore, he stated that the consequences of these claims would leave “scars that may never fully heal.”
According to the lawsuit, the video’s defamatory nature has caused severe damage to Nakhua’s personal and professional reputation. The lawsuit claims that the video’s broad distribution has subjected Nakhua to scorn and ridicule, resulting in irreparable harm. Nakhua is demanding Rs 20 lakh in damages for defamation caused by the video.
The slander complaint comes after Rathee faced another legal hurdle recently. Maharashtra’s nodal cyber police have filed a charge against him for a tweet on his parody account on X (previously Twitter).