“By allowing someone accused by multiple people of sexual harassment in its newsroom, Wion and Zee TV are violating the responsibility they have to journalists who carry out the important mission of informing the public,” the statement said.
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Over 150 journalists, writers, and artists have released a statement against Zee News and WION hiring MJ Akbar, former editor and Union minister who has been accused of sexual harassment by multiple women. Newslaundry had reported that Akbar will be returning to the newsroom as part of the WION’s team. WION is an English news channel under Zee Media. While Akbar’s hiring wasn’t made official, Akbar had been attending the editorial meetings. The statement released by over 150 journalists and others expresses opposition to Akbar’s hiring at WION, and also asks the Editors Guild to take up the matter. Akbar was accused of sexual harassment and misconduct by around 20 women during the Me Too movement in 2018. He also sued one of the women who spoke out against him, journalist Priya Ramani, for defamation. A Delhi court acquitted Priya in the defamation case in February this year. The signatories of the statement against Akbar joining WION’s newsroom point out newsrooms need to be safe environments, and by hiring Akbar, WION could also send out a wrong message, silencing of journalists at the channel and elsewhere. Read the full statement below. 9 September 2021 We the undersigned call upon WION to stop MJ Akbar from being employed in its newsroom. We also call upon the Editors Guild to take up this matter. There should be no room for sexual harassment and sexual harassers at workplaces. Journalists are in the business of speaking out. By allowing someone accused by multiple people of sexual harassment in its newsroom, WION and Zee TV are violating the responsibility they have to journalists who carry out the important mission of informing the public. MJ Akbar has not just sued a fellow journalist for speaking out, but filed a complaint of criminal defamation effectively seeking to put a fellow woman journalist behind bars. By choosing to employ MJ Akbar, WION is failing journalists and ignoring the traumatic experiences of more than 20 women who have courageously spoken out about MJ Akbar's despicable misuse of power. Our message to WION and others is that by putting MJ Akbar in a position of power will have a chilling effect of silencing its own and other journalists against abuse. In 2013, India adopted a law that calls for the prevention, prohibition and redressal of sexual harassment of women at workplace. It calls for women to have the right to work with dignity under Article 21 of the Constitution and right to practice any profession or to carry on any occupation, trade or business which includes a right to a safe environment work free from sexual harassment. How will India's news media report sexual misconduct and hold others accountable when it doesn't hold such standards on its own? The undersigned call upon all media houses to make our newsrooms safe. We also call upon the Editors Guild of India, which suspended MJ Akbar in 2018, to ask every news organization to bar him from its newsrooms because a clear, meaningful message needs to be sent out to young female journalists that the Guild is committed to ensuring a safe working space for them where they are respected and encouraged to speak up. Read: Priya Ramani is a trailblazer and her victory matters to all of us ‘Woman can speak up any time’: Priya Ramani case verdict validates Me Too movement
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