A Delhi court on Monday restored the criminal defamation complaint filed by Samata Party leader Jaya Jaitly against the editor of tehelka.com portal, Tarun Tejpal, following a high court order to this effect.

Metropolitan Magistrate Gulshan Kumar fixed April 14 for further hearing.

Jaitly had filed the complaint against Tejpal for allegedly showing her in bad light by involving her in the defence scandal.

The court had on December 3 dismissed the complaint on the ground of 'non-prosecution' after Jaitly and her lawyers failed to appear in the court to present their case.

The metropolitan magistrate had earlier issued summons to the portal and its editor for allegedly displaying an article on February 26, 2002, accusing Jaitly of misusing her office and indulging in corruption.

Jaitly, in her complaint, had submitted that the statements displayed on the Web site were 'totally false'. She denied having 'ever received supposed arms dealers and middle men or accepted any sum of money, including Rs200,000... as alleged by the portal'.

The high court had on January 20 allowed Jaitly's plea to restore the complaint after she and her advocate filed separate affidavits stating they had wrongly noted the date of hearing of the case before the metropolitan magistrate.

PTI