Mumbai Mar 24 PTI Actor Kangana Ranaut might be a celebrity having professional assignments but she cannot forget that she is an accused in a case a local court has said while refusing to grant her permanent exemption from appearance in a defamation complaint filed by Bollywood lyricist Javed Akhtar Metropolitan Magistrate R R Khan had on Tuesday rejected Ranauts application seeking permanent exemption from appearance in which she had cited her professional commitments The detailed order was made available Thursday Per contra the accused is dictating her own terms for the trial of this case in the manner she likes Admittedly the accused cannot claim permanent exemption as of right The accused has to follow the established procedure of law and terms and conditions of her bail bonds the court said in its order Magistrate Khan further said that till date the court has approved her exemption pleas for those dates as sought by her for previous hearings without imposing a cost Till date the accused has not appeared with an intent to cooperate with the court for the trial of allegations levelled against her the order said Akhtar filed the complaint in the court in November 2020 claiming Ranaut had made defamatory statements against him in a television interview which allegedly damaged his reputation Ranaut sought permanent exemption from appearance saying she is one of the top most actresses of the Hindi film industry and she needs to travel to different parts of the country and international locations for professional commitments The court however rejected her application and said No doubt being a celebrity the accused Ranaut is having her professional assignments but she cannot forget that she is an accused in this case For the fair progress of the trial her cooperation is essential in the matter It is pertinent to mention here that the accused has built up her mind that her presence in this case is not necessary and her advocate will look after the legal formalities the court said in the order If the accused is permanently exempted at this juncture then the complainant a senior citizen will be seriously prejudiced and there will be no progress in the trial it said Akhtars advocate had opposed the application arguing that Ranaut was showing a casual attitude towards the court The court in its order noted that the case was for the offence of defamation in which the complainant Akhtar is a senior citizen and particulars of the offence are yet to be framed It said Ranaut in the past made several unsuccessful attempts to challenge the earlier orders of the court regarding issuance of process and getting the case transferred to another court the accused has shown her interest in obtaining permanent exemption on the ground of her busy schedules Till date the accused has not appeared for framing of particulars of offence though the matter was specifically kept for her appearance for framing of particulars of offence the order said In his complaint Akhtar claimed that Ranaut dragged his name during an interview while referring to a coterie existing in Bollywood following the alleged suicide by actor Sushant Singh Rajput Ranaut had later filed a counter complaint in the same court against Akhtar for alleged extortion and criminal intimidation The actor in her complaint against Akhtar said following her public dispute with her co-star the lyricist had called her and her sister Rangoli Chandel to his house with malafide intentions and ulterior motives and then criminally intimidated and threatened her PTI SP GK GK

New Delhi Jan 20 PTI In the first sentencing in a case related to the northeast Delhi riots a court here on Thursday awarded a five-year jail term to a man for putting a house belonging to an old woman on fire saying that offence committed by him was a very serious one Additional Sessions Judge Virender Bhat sentenced the 25-year-old Dinesh Yadav to five years in jail and directed him to pay Rs 12000 to the victim as compensation Dinesh Yadav was convicted on December 6 2021 for being an active member of the riotous mob and participating in vandalizing and putting on fire the house of a 73-year-old woman named Manori Devi on February 25 2020 This order holds importance as Yadav is the first person to be convicted and sent to jail in the northeast Delhi riots case Communal clashes had broken out in the capital in February 2020 leaving at least 53 people dead and over 700 injured As per the court order Devi had earlier received some compensation from the Delhi government for the loss She had admittedly suffered a loss of about Rs 5 lakh due to the riotous incident The judge observed that it would be totally unjustified to direct Yadav to pay any further compensation to the victim or compensate Rs 83000 expenditure incurred by the prosecution as he is unemployed has no property or the paying capacity Sentencing the convict the judge said It can not be gainsaid that the offence committed by the convict was a very serious one However no evidence had been led by the prosecution to prove that the unlawful assembly of which the convict was a member had been formed in pursuance to some conspiracy The court also considered his young age clean past antecedents and the fact that he was a first-time offender while deciding on the quantum of the punishment Admittedly the convict is a first time offender and has clean past antecedents There was no evidence that he had directly committed the incident of violence The young age of the convict also deserves to be kept in consideration while deciding the quantum of sentence to be imposed upon him ASJ Bhat noted Yadav was convicted for being a member of an unlawful assembly rioting arson house trespassing and robbery offences which entail a jail term of up to ten years Special Public Prosecutor R C S Bhadoria had urged the court to impose maximum possible punishment upon the convict saying that he was found guilty for being part of an unlawful assembly which created large scale disturbances to defame India Yadavs lawyer however requested the judge for a lenient sentence since he had reformed himself and learnt his lesson by spending more than a year in jail Yadav was arrested on June 8 2020 The court framed charges against him on August 3 2021 to which he pleaded not guilty and claimed trialPTI AAK SA