Puran Gurung/ Thimphu Thimphu District Court dismissed 'The State vs. Penjore' for litigation as a sedition case, the court ordered the Attorney General's Office to pursue a defamation case, OAG confirms not to appeal the matter further. On June 18, 2021 the Office of Attorney General filed a sedition case against the individual Penjore to Thimphu Dzongkhag Court; the court dismissed the case for a change of charge and that the charge sheet was not seditious. Stating that to respect judicial independence, the Attorney General's Office will not appeal the case again. On June 18, 2021, the court had ordered the Office of the Attorney General to change the charges and pursue the case further. As the Chief Judge had verbally announced that the case had a change of charges to dismiss the case, the OAG prosecutors sought a written order on the same day. After receiving the written order, the corpus comprising senior seven Attorneys along with Attorney General decided not to pursue the appeal to respect judicial independence. OAG hopes that mainstream media and online media forums learn to write balanced, accountable and cautious articles. According to sources, the OAG prosecutors expressed the need to appeal the case. However, there were no complainants; the OAG prosecutors had also expressed to write to institutions and individuals to complain of defamation against the individual and appeal the case again. To this, the Attorney General and the corpus declined, stating that the 'constitution experts and history will judge the case'. The OAG also states that 'if the defendant doesn't restrain, it may appeal the case against the individual'. Penjore, the businessman, the defendant of the case, states that he will be releasing his views to the public at the earliest date. Earlier, upon the complaint by the Office of the Attorney General, the defendant was detained by the Royal Bhutan Police and the case after a thorough investigation was forwarded to the OAG for prosecution. He was arrested and detained for 16 days for his alleged defamatory posts against public officials and institutions- OAG yesterday had presented the chargesheet for sedition, and the Bench I dismissed the case. On defamation charges, the Thimphu District Court had issued a remand order to the Royal Bhutan Police against the businessman, Penjore, for investigation. The court had also granted the businessman a bail of two months for the same charges and not for sedition after the remand period. Meanwhile, the Office of the Attorney General initiated legal action for maligning the Judiciary, Royal Government institutions, including the OAG and other public officials, with unsubstantiated, scurrilous and contemptuous comments on Facebook over the years by the individual, Penjore, a businessman. To file the case, the Attorney General's Office invoked Article 29, section (5) of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Bhutan and Sections 67 (1 & 5) and 70 of the Attorney General Act, 2015. In the charge sheet, as the OAG had mentioned that the individual Penjore maligned the judiciary, the court clarified that there were no complaints from the judiciary.
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