The Supreme Court has issued criminal contempt notice to Congress President Rahul Gandhi for his “chowkidar chor hai” remark on Prime Minister Narendra Modi while referring to the Rafale judgment. The apex court maintained the comment was “incorrectly attributed” to it.

The top court said it will hear on April 30 the criminal contempt petition filed by BJP MP Meenakshi Lekhi against Gandhi along with the pending review petition against the December 14, 2018 verdict in the Rafale fighter jet deal. It rejected Gandhi’s plea to close the criminal contempt petition filed by Lekhi.

On hearing senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, on behalf of Gandhi, a bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi said: “We deem it fit to issue notice to the respondent (Rahul) Gandhi.”

While the BJP was once again in attack mode after the notice, the Congress said Rahul Gandhi didn’t intend to commit contempt of court.

Rahul Gandhi had expressed “regret” on Monday over his remarks in connection with the Rafale judgment and said in his affidavit that his statement was “purely political”.

The apex court on April 15 had given a categorical clarification that in its Rafale verdict there was no occasion for it to make a mention of the contemptuous “chowkidar Narendra Modi chor hain” observation. Meenakshi Lekhi had filed a contempt petition after Rahul Gandhi’s comment.