MeToo movement: Journalist accuses Ex-Editor, MoS MJ Akbar of sexual harassment

As the Me Too movement in India gathers momentum, fresh allegations of sexual harassment have been levied against former journalist and the current Minister of State for External Affairs MJ Akbar. Female journalist Priya Ramani published a detailed account of him violating consent when he was a journalist.

In her 2017 article titled “To the Harvey Weinsteins of the world” where she never named Akbar ‘because he didn’t “do” anything’, she said that he conducted uncomfortable interviews with female journalists in hotel rooms.

The article was an open letter to “Dear Male Boss” that referred to a job interview in a hotel room in Mumbai. Ramani said, “You’re an expert on obscene phone calls, texts, inappropriate compliments and not taking no for an answer.”

In her article, she said, “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”.

After Priya Ramani’s accusation, several female colleagues have come forward as part of India’s Me Too movement

MJ Akbar is the founding editor of The Telegraph and was with the newspaper till 1989 and was associated with leading media houses and periodicals in India including India Today, Headlines Today, The Telegraph, The Asian Age and Deccan Chronicle',' among others. Akbar was inducted into the Union Council of Ministers for External Affairs by PM Narendra Modi on 5 July 2016.

Akbar found support in fellow Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Udit Raj who questioned why it took 10 years for the woman to make sexual charges. He doubted whether the truth in the case would be properly investigated. “One needs to realise the degree of damage caused to a person facing such false accusations. This (MeToo) is the beginning of a wrong trend,” he tweeted and reiterated the same in a telephonic conversation to ABP News.