New Delhi: As the Me Too movement in India gathers momentum, allegations of sexual assault have surfaced against current Minister of State for External Affairs MJ Akbar, in detailed accounts of him violating consent and conducting uncomfortable interviews with female journalists in hotel rooms.
“I began this piece with my MJ Akbar story. Never named him because he didn’t ‘do’ anything,” journalist Priya Ramani tweeted, referring to an article she wrote for the Vogue magazine in 2017.
I began this piece with my MJ Akbar story. Never named him because he didn’t “do” anything. Lots of women have worse stories about this predator—maybe they’ll share. #ulti https://t.co/5jVU5WHHo7
— Priya Ramani (@priyaramani) October 8, 2018
Ramani shared an account from 1997 when she was a rookie in the media industry and Akbar was her ‘boss’. In a article for Vogue in 2017 after the Harvey Weinstein incident broke open the #MeToo movement around the world, Ramani said that Akbar invited her into a hotel room in Mumbai around 7pm, when she was 23 and he was 43, for an interview and made uncomfortable moves towards her.
“Turns out you were as talented a predator as you were a writer. It was more date, less interview. You offered me a drink from the mini bar (I refused, you drank vodka), we sat on a small table for two that overlooked the Queen’s Necklace and you sang me old Hindi songs after inquiring after my musical preferences. You thought you were irresistible,” she wrote. Ramani further alleged that Akbar asked her to sit beside him on the bed in the middle of the interview. “I escaped that night, you hired me, I worked for you for many months even though I swore I would never be in a room alone with you again.”
She vehemently protested his advances and shot a flaming arrow at his character. “You’re an expert on obscene phone calls, texts, inappropriate compliments and not taking no for an answer. You know how to pinch, pat, rub, grab and assault,” she wrote. Akbar has not responded to the allegations as he is travelling outside the country at present, according to media reports. “We’ll get you all one day,” Ramani signed off.
The article was written last year against the backdrop of the outing of Harvey Weinstein, the American film producer hit by allegations that triggered the MeToo movement. Another woman has also attested to the allegations and said that she was also on the receiving end of the same kinds of offers by Akbar. The incident, she said, occurred in 1995 in Taj Palace in Kolkata after which she declined the job offer. Soon after Ramani’s tweet, other journalists also accused Akbar of calling women to his hotel rooms for interviews, or making women feel uncomfortable by seeking to be alone with them.
He was this brilliant,flamboyant #editor who dabbled in politics, who called me-my 1st job- to his hotel room to 'discuss work', after i put the edition to bed-read midnight, & made life at work hell when i refused.,cudnt speak up due to various compulsions, but yes #MeTooIndia
— prerna singh bindra (@prernabindra) October 6, 2018
OMG! He turned up at my friend's house one night for a coffee. As a single mother with a sleeping child she told him she could neither invite him in nor go out with him. From next day he made life hell for her at their workplace https://t.co/3XRj7oWK94
— Sujata Anandan (@sujataanandan) October 8, 2018
So many of us have an MJ story. "Can I come over to your house with a bottle of rum?" he said. NO, was the answer…. Couldnt 'do' anything. Some dont get the meaning of No… they move on to the next, dont they https://t.co/eMnO6Y3PNX
— Harinder Baweja (@shammybaweja) October 8, 2018
In this case, #MeToo. Year: 1995, Place Taj Bengal, Kolkata. After that encounter, I declined the job offer.
— Shuma Raha (@ShumaRaha) October 8, 2018
