High Court overturns defamation ruling, orders new damages hearing

In a recent judgment, High Court Judge Azlan Sulaiman overturned the April 30 decision of the Butterworth Session Court that had dismissed Lingeshwaran's defamation claim and imposed RM15,000 in costs on him. The High Court instead granted an injunction preventing Ramasamy from republishing the disputed statements and ordered him to pay the same amount in costs to Lingeshwaran, referring the matter back to the Session Court for a damages determination.

Previously, Session Court Judge Zulhazmi Abdullah had found Ramasamy's first comment non-defamatory, treating it as political criticism, while deeming the second comment potentially defamatory but shielded by the doctrine of fair comment and qualified privilege. The case stems from two statements Ramasamy made in one outlet's article about a proposal to open UiTM's cardiothoracic surgery postgraduate program to non-Malay students, which Lingeshwaran claimed harmed his professional reputation.