Me Too
Ghazala told the court that she was encouraged by the Me Too movement to share her story.
The hearing in the defamation case filed by former Minister MJ Akbar against journalist Priya Ramani, who accused him of sexual harassment, came up for hearing at the court of the Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate in Delhi on Tuesday. MJ Akbar was accused of sexual misconduct by over 20 women during the Me Too movement in India, following which he resigned as the Minister of State of the External Affairs Ministry.
FORCE newsmagazine executive editor Ghazala Wahab, who had written an article on the news website The Wire detailing the sequence of events and allegations against Akbar, reiterated the same when she took the stand in court as a witness for Priya Ramani. Before Priya Ramani had named MJ Akbar, Ghazala had in 2018 tweeted: “I wonder when the floodgates will open about @mjakbar.”
Testifying in court, Ghazala said that her desk at the Asian Age office, where Akbar was the editor, was placed right outside his cabin so that when his door was ajar, he could watch her.
“Many times while I was working on my PC, when I looked up from my screen, I found Akbar watching me,” she reportedly said in court.
Following this, she detailed that she started receiving personal messages on Asian Age’s intranet messaging service.
Furthermore, she said that in August 1997, MJ Akbar called her to his room, asked her to shut the door, and asked her to look up a word in the dictionary which was placed on a stool across his desk. “It (the book) was placed so low that one had to bend down,” she said.
“When I bent down, MJ Akbar came from behind and grabbed my waist. He ran his hands from my breasts to my hips. I tried to push his hands away but they were firmly planted on my waist,” she said.
According to LiveLaw, Ghazala told the court that Akbar was pressing his thumbs against her breasts and stopped after a while. “I resisted. Not only was the door shut, his back was against it,” she told the court.
However, this was not the only incident. Ghazala recounted the incident that took place the next day, which she had also written about in The Wire.
“The next evening, he called me in his cabin. I knocked and entered. He was standing next to the door and before I could react he shut the door, trapping me between his body and the door. I instinctively flinched, but he held me and bent to kiss me. With my mouth clamped shut, I struggled to turn my face to one side. The jostling continued, without much success. I had no space to manoeuvre. Fear had rendered me speechless. As my body was pushing against the door, at some point he let me go. Tear-stricken, I ran out,” she then wrote.
In court, after recounting this, when Ghazala told the bureau chief about what had happened, the latter allegedly said that it was Ghazala’s call on what to do further.
“Workplaces in 1997 were very different from workplaces now. Women were not encouraged to speak out against male colleagues,” she told the court.
When she tried to get out of the situation by leaving, Akbar told her that he wanted her to shift to Ahmedabad, where she would be a features editor, and that she would be given an apartment. According to Ghazala, Akbar said that whenever he would come to Ahmedabad, he would stay with her.
She then reportedly started clearing her desk for the next two weeks under the pretext of moving to Ahmedabad, but handed in her resignation on the day she was to move.
Ghazala told the court that she was encouraged by the Me Too movement to share her story.
FORCE newsmagazine executive editor Ghazala Wahab, who had written an article on the news website The Wire detailing the sequence of events and allegations against Akbar, reiterated the same when she took the stand in court as a witness for Priya Ramani. Before Priya Ramani had named MJ Akbar, Ghazala had in 2018 tweeted: “I wonder when the floodgates will open about @mjakbar.”
Testifying in court, Ghazala said that her desk at the Asian Age office, where Akbar was the editor, was placed right outside his cabin so that when his door was ajar, he could watch her.
“Many times while I was working on my PC, when I looked up from my screen, I found Akbar watching me,” she reportedly said in court.
Following this, she detailed that she started receiving personal messages on Asian Age’s intranet messaging service.
Furthermore, she said that in August 1997, MJ Akbar called her to his room, asked her to shut the door, and asked her to look up a word in the dictionary which was placed on a stool across his desk. “It (the book) was placed so low that one had to bend down,” she said.
“When I bent down, MJ Akbar came from behind and grabbed my waist. He ran his hands from my breasts to my hips. I tried to push his hands away but they were firmly planted on my waist,” she said.
According to LiveLaw, Ghazala told the court that Akbar was pressing his thumbs against her breasts and stopped after a while. “I resisted. Not only was the door shut, his back was against it,” she told the court.
However, this was not the only incident. Ghazala recounted the incident that took place the next day, which she had also written about in The Wire.
“The next evening, he called me in his cabin. I knocked and entered. He was standing next to the door and before I could react he shut the door, trapping me between his body and the door. I instinctively flinched, but he held me and bent to kiss me. With my mouth clamped shut, I struggled to turn my face to one side. The jostling continued, without much success. I had no space to manoeuvre. Fear had rendered me speechless. As my body was pushing against the door, at some point he let me go. Tear-stricken, I ran out,” she then wrote.
In court, after recounting this, when Ghazala told the bureau chief about what had happened, the latter allegedly said that it was Ghazala’s call on what to do further.
“Workplaces in 1997 were very different from workplaces now. Women were not encouraged to speak out against male colleagues,” she told the court.
When she tried to get out of the situation by leaving, Akbar told her that he wanted her to shift to Ahmedabad, where she would be a features editor, and that she would be given an apartment. According to Ghazala, Akbar said that whenever he would come to Ahmedabad, he would stay with her.
She then reportedly started clearing her desk for the next two weeks under the pretext of moving to Ahmedabad, but handed in her resignation on the day she was to move.
Ghazala told the court that she was encouraged by the Me Too movement to share her story.
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Source: TheNewsMinute.com