the external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj<\/a> for the opportunity they gave me to serve my country,\u201d Akbar said.[\/vc_column_text][vc_raw_html]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[\/vc_raw_html][vc_column_text]\u201cI think it’s the right decision and it would be better if he withdraws his case,\u201d Ghazala Wahab, one of the journalists who had accused MJ Akbar of sexual harassment, told CNN-News18.<\/p>\nAkbar was accused of sexual misconduct during his years as a journalist and newspaper editor. He has termed the allegations against him as \u201cbaseless\u201d and \u201cfabricated\u201d.<\/p>\n
He also alleged that it was a political conspiracy scripted ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.<\/p>\n
Ramani was the first to name Akbar in a Twitter post October 8, following which over ten women also levelled sexual harassment allegations against him. In a statement issued on Sunday, Akbar had named four other women who had accused him but filed the criminal defamation complaint only against Ramani.<\/p>\n
Akbar, in his complaint, said he was seeking appropriate punitive action.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat the scandalous allegations levelled against the complainant, by their very tone and tenor, are ex facie defamatory and have not only damaged the goodwill and reputation of the complainant, in his social circles and on the political stage, established years of toil and hard work, but have also affected the personal reputation of the complainant in the community, friends, family and colleagues, thereby causing him irreparable loss and tremendous distress,\u201d his complaint stated.<\/p>\n
After the complaint was filed, as many as 20 journalists who have worked under him went on record to ask the court to \u201cconsider testimonies of sexual harassment of some of us at the hands of\u201d Akbar and of others \u201cwho bore witness to this harassment.\u201d<\/p>\n
The BJP, which initially maintained a stoic silence on the issue, distanced itself from Akbar, claiming that the incidents date to a time when Akbar was not a member of the party. The party has also argued that seeking legal recourse to defend his name was a right that cannot be denied to Akbar. BJP president Amit Shah, however, said the party will look into the charges to ascertain their veracity.<\/p>\n
Women and child development (WCD) minister Maneka Gandhi announced the setting up of a committee to examine all issues emanating from the \u2018#Metoo\u2019 movement, which captures stories of harassment recounted by women.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe in the pain and trauma behind every single complaint. Cases of sexual harassment at work must be dealt with a policy of zero tolerance,\u201d Maneka Gandhi said, announcing the committee last week. There has been no action yet towards forming the committee.<\/p>\n
Most BJP MPs and ministers have refrained from commenting on the issue. Senior functionaries who spoke on the condition of anonymity said there was \u201cdiscomfort\u201d within the party over the charges levelled against the minister, and many were of the opinion that he should step down.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Minister of State for External Affairs MJ Akbar, facing allegations of sexual harassment by more than 10 women journalists, resigned from his post today (Wednesday, October 17). On Monday, he had filed a case of criminal defamation against Priya Ramani, the first woman journalist to name him as a harasser in the #MeToo movement. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":50771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1497],"tags":[86,16345,42759,2126,430,212],"yst_prominent_words":[37178,6603,4772,57754,15401,57753,57750,5975,31653,57751,22426,3688,57389,57752,57757,57755,57749,11772,22373,4331],"ppma_author":[140543],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/d2r2ijn7njrktv.cloudfront.net\/apnlive\/uploads\/2018\/10\/17181148\/mj-akbar2.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":140543,"user_id":4,"is_guest":0,"slug":"apnnewsdesk","display_name":"APN Live","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/478eacb893eda88aa6ed8d99b005bf58?s=96&r=g"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50767"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50767"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=50767"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=50767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}