Subcontinental Politics in NY

Saja is reporting on a suit filled in NY against the BJP by the supporters of the Congress Party.

Defendants in a $100 million lawsuit filed in New York by members of the Indian National Overseas Congress (INOC) are seeking to have it dismissed. The defendants, who are aligned with the Overseas Friends of BJP, placed a $65,000 ad criticizing Sonia Gandhi in The New York Times last October (click on the image to enlarge), during her visit to New York. Some background from The New York Sun:

The suit, filed recently in state court in Manhattan, seeks $100 million in damages against several New Yorkers who marked a recent visit by Ms. Gandhi to the United Nations by criticizing her in an advertisement placed in the New York Times.

The suit was brought by a New York organization that claims to be a subsidiary of India's National Congress Party, which Ms. Gandhi heads. It is extremely unusual, if not unprecedented, for a foreign political party to sue for libel in an American court.

The defendants include Narain Kataria, who said he retired a decade ago after a career as a legal secretary at the New York-based firm Cahill Gordon & Reindel, and Arish Sahani, who said he retired as an agent at the New York Life Insurance Co.

Ms. Gandhi, whom Forbes.com once declared the third most powerful woman in the world, was in New York last October for the anniversary of Mohandas Gandhi's birth, which the United Nations has declared the International Day of Non-Violence.

The article suggests that Sonia Gandhi had nothing to do with the lawsuit. A lawyer for the defendants, Daniel Kornstein, claims the lawsuit is an effort to "to muzzle and punish Congress Party critics in America."

Mr. Kornstein noted that Mohandas Gandhi himself once headed the National Congress Party and was an advocate of free speech.

Of this libel case, Mr. Kornstein wrote, "Gandhi would not approve."

But INOC's lawyer, Sheldon Karasik, said there are limits to free speech.

"The totality of the statements clearly crosses the line," Mr. Karasik, who has filed a similar complaint in state court in New Jersey, said of the advertisement. "It's one thing perhaps to stand up on a soapbox and rant but it is another thing to be very specific and gather a laundry list of alleged wrongs that are supposedly statements of fact."

Here's what Santosh at UberDesi had to say about the ad:

To me, the ad seemed like a huge waste of money. To those who knew Sonia Gandhi, they probably already made up their mind to like her or hate her and the ad was not going to change that. To those who were not familiar with Sonia Gandhi (layman on the streets of America), the ad basically conveyed to them that Sonia was not related to Mohandas Gandhi. Other than that, Americans are used to seeing attack ads in mass media on a regular basis and are probably inured to them by now. So in essence, they spent $65,000 to take out a full page ad saying someone is not related to someone. Think of it this way, an American in India takes out a full page ad in the Times Of India saying George Washington is not related to Denzel Washington (totally random choice of two people with similar last names). Americans in India know that and Indians in India probably know that and even if they don’t, they could care less. The entire effort seems like a massive waste of money and resources, not counting the lawsuit which is breathing down their necks.