In a recent series of events famous singer Malini Awasthi has issued a legal notice dated 20.05.20 to Gaurav Pandhi who is the National Coordinator, Digital Communications & Social Media, Indian National Congress over his defamatory tweet. 

Malini Awasthi is a renowned singer for the past four decades and had been awarded by the President of India with the Padma Shri in 2016. She has been appointed as the Centenary Chair Professor for the India Study Centre at the Banaras Hindu University and has also been awarded the coveted Sangeet Natak Akademi Award. 

The notice was issued regarding Mr. Gaurav’s tweet dated 19.05.20 from his twitter account which stated the following “UP Addl Chief Secretary @AwasthiAwanishKis behaving like BJP’s Shakhaboy, against poor migrant workers. It is because his wife Malini Awasthi does hundreds of shows for UP Govt and hence earning crores from BJP Govt. their bank account statements won’t be surprising at all.”

It was noted that the tweet carried various pictures and sensitive information about the complainant’s husband. It was also submitted in the notice that the callous statement had been retweeted by about 1724 users and liked by about 4904users. 

The notice stated that the tweet is scandalous and malicious and one which cannot be justified by any stretch of logic or reasoning. It further alleged that through the tweet, the Congressman also published an imputation intending to harm Awasthi’s reputation knowingly and having reason to believe that such imputation would seriously harm the reputation and therefore had defamed her.