Kota case: Court records statement of complainant

A court today recorded the statement of the complainant in a defamation suit which has alleged that the director of a Delhi-based institute put out advertisements in newspapers describing Kota as the "suicide capital of India".
Special court NI-1 fixed the next hearing in the suit on January 7.
Manohar Pareek, senior vice president of Kota Press Club, had on November 18 filed the case against D K Goel, the Director of FIIT JEE institute in Delhi, under sections 500 (defamation), 504 (intentional insult) and 505 (statements conducing to public mischief) of IPC, Devender Kumar Verma, the lawyer of the complainant, said.

The complainant alleged that the advertisements in national dailies "defamed my city and adversely affected local business and industry".
The advertisements, published in a Hindi and an English newspaper on August 31, November 28 and December 4, described the coaching hub of Kota, which attracts around 1.75 medical and engineering aspirants from across the country annually, as "the suicide capital of India", it alleged.
"Unethical institutions, most of them from Kota, purchase results and poach brilliant students," the advertisements had said as per the complaint.
Pareek said the ads alleged that coaching institutions in Kota were "driving students to commit suicide".