While responding to the actor's plea, Akhtar said that the petition had been filed with an aim the to delay the said proceedings.
A division bench of Justices Revati Mohite-Dere and Manjusha A Deshpande directed the court registry to verify whether the matter be heard by a single-judge bench or a division bench.
Akhtar had filed the defamation complaint against Ranaut in 2020.
He alleged that Ranaut made defamatory statements on national and international television, “in what appears to be a clear campaign to malign and tarnish (Akhtar) in the eyes of the general public”.
