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The Supreme Court on Monday stayed Rahul Gandhi’s conviction in a defamation case over his Modi surname remark, faulting the trial court order for awarding the maximum punishment of two years — which led to his disqualification from the Lok Sabha — without spelling out any specific reason, though maintaining that his utterance was “not in good taste”. The court's order would restore him as the MP from Wayanad.

Holding that ramifications of Section 8(3) of the Representation of the People Act to bar lawmakers from contesting elections after being sentenced for two or more years, are “wide-ranging” as it affects also the right of the electorate that elected him, a bench of Justices B R Gavai, P S Narasimha and Sanjay Kumar took less than an hour to pass the order in Rahul's favour. The court noted that the trial court sentenced Rahul to two years of imprisonment — the maximum for criminal defamation — but did not lay out the reason, a relevant fact that was overlooked even by the Gujarat high court, which had rejected the Congress functionary’s plea for stay of conviction. It said there was not even “whisper” on this by the trial court.

Since the monsoon session began, the opposition parties and Centre have been at loggerheads over the Manipur issue. The opposition wants the Prime Minister to speak on the issue and to ensure the same they have also moved a no-trust motion against the Modi government. The past two weeks have witnessed utter chaos and disruptions in both houses of Parliament over a disagreement between the Opposition and treasury benches on the rule under which the situation in the northeastern state should be discussed.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh has come up with an idea which is aimed at resolving this crisis. The Congress leader took to Twitter to share this as he called the proposal to end the impasse in the Parliament a "middle path".

The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to stay on a petition seeking to stop the rallies announced by Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal in Delhi-NCR to protest against the violence that has ensued in Nuh, Haryana.

The apex court said that the law and order situation in Nuh is a policing issue that must be taken care of.

“We are not going this way or that way.. law and order is policing issue which must be taken care of. Let them take action as per law so that there is no violence, hate speech, law and order issues, Deploy additional police force and the CCTV cameras,” the court said.

India’s anti-terror agency, the National Investigation Agency (NIA), raided 31 locations across Punjab and Haryana states to locate the culprits involved in the attacks on Indian High Commission in London on March 19.

The agency carried out searches on Tuesday (August 1) to search and identify and arrest all those involved in the attack organised by pro-Khalistani elements.

“It has been carrying out extensive investigations into the incident with a view to ensuring there is no repeat of such breach of security, disrespect to the Indian National Flag or any threat to Indian interests abroad,” said the NIA statement.

The Supreme Court Monday termed as “horrendous” the video of two women being paraded naked in Manipur amid reports that the police handed them over to the rioting mob, asked searching questions over delayed registration of the FIR and mooted the idea of setting up a committee of retired judges or an SIT to oversee the probe.

Describing the violence perpetrated against women in strife-torn Manipur as one of "unprecedented magnitude", the top court refused to consider vehement submissions of lawyer and BJP leader Bansuri Swaraj that similar alleged incidents in opposition-ruled states like West Bengal, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Kerala be also taken note of.

Seeking report about the action taken by the state in around 6,000 cases related to the ethnic conflict, a bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud said Manipur police cannot be allowed to continue with its probe in view of the news reports that it were policemen who virtually handed over the women to the mob.