MJ Akbar should be asked to step down, demand women journalists

A group of women journalists has written to President Ram Nath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi demanding the dismissal of Union Minister M J AkbarThe Network of Women in Media in India also demanded that the Ministry of External Affairs should ask him to step down pending a probeBesides the 15 women who have narrated incidents where Akbar sexually harassed them 19 women told Patiala House Court that they will testify about their own experiences with him while they worked in Asian Age between 19932000The women said Ramani had lifted the lid on the culture of casual misogyny entitlement and sexual predation that Akbar presided over at The Asian Age The website Scrollin listed the 19 as Meenal Baghel Manisha Pande Tushita Patel Kanika Gahlaut Suparna Sharma Ramola Talwar Badam Kaniza Gazari Malavika Banerjee A T Jayanthi Hamida Parkar Jonali Buragohain Sanjari Chatterjee Meenakshi Kumar Sujata Dutta Sachdeva Hoihnu Hauzel Reshmi Chakraborty Kushalrani Gulab Aisha Khan and Kiran ManralDefamation case to be heard on Oct 18Union Minister M J Akbars defamation case against journalist Priya Ramani who had accused him of sexual harassment will be heard on Thursday October 18 The defamation case will be heard by a magisterial court in the Patiala House court complex on October 18 Akbars Counsel Sandeep Kapur said on TuesdayBJP IS INSENSITIVEBSP statement In this whole M J Akbar episode the antiwomen face of the BJP government has been exposed By not asking the minister to resign BJP is being arrogant and insensitiveRahul GandhiCongress presidentThe BJPs slogan of beti bachao beti padhao must now be reframed into BJP ke mantri aur MLA se beti bachaoSome more allegations against akbar In an article released by Scrollin former journalist Tushita Patel has accused M J Akbar of harassing her when she was a trainee in The Telegraph and again in 1993 when she joined Deccan Chronicle as a senior subeditor Akbar was the editorinchief of the newspaper then Referring to the minister she has shared a couple of her encounters with him Speaking about one such incident she said You came in to town and summoned me to your hotel to discuss my pages I was late I had to finish my pages When I reached your room you were sullen sitting there drinking tea and in a vile mood You started yelling at me about being late about my work I was trying to mumble some words Suddenly you got up grabbed me and kissed me hard mdash your stale tea breath and your bristly moustache are still etched in the recesses of my memory I wriggled out and ran till I reached the road jumped into an auto rickshaw and started crying In a personal blog written by Swati Gautam for an online news portal she talks about her encounter with Akbar when she went to invite him for the annual Father Jorris Memorial Nihil Ultra Debate at St Xaviers College Calcutta Alumni Association of which she was the convener at his room in the Taj Hotel She says The door opened and the Bathrobe welcomed me Mr Bathrobe was on the bed while I was kind of squirming on the single sofa in the room unable to exactly fathom what in hell was the matter with the world which seemed perfectly normal sometime back Bending down he rolled the glass in his hand towards me He verbally prompted me to make the drink When my initial shock wore off I too bent down and rolled it back at him That buoyed me up Giving him a hard stare I got up and walked out of that dratted room and as far away as I could from The Bathrobe thankful that he didnt do anythingCatch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updatesThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever