Woman media persons in Kerala staged a sit-in protest in front of the Press Club office on Thursday, demanding the ouster of Thiruvananthapuram Press Club secretary M Radhakrishnan, who has been accused of harassing and moral policing a woman journalist by barging into her house in the night. The journalists have demanded that he should be removed from the post of Press Club secretary.
The incident took place on Saturday night when the woman journalist was in her house with her two children. Radhakrishnan, who works with the woman in the same media organisation, barged into her house along with a group of people, and started insulting and harassing her. He also forcibly brought back the woman’s male friend, who had visited her house sometime prior to the incident, and insinuated a relationship between her and the friend.
Though a police case has been registered against Radhakrishnan based on the complaint of the woman, he is yet to be arrested.
Since Radhakrishnan was not at the Press Club office at the time of the protest, the female journalists handed over a bottle of cow dung water to the president and said, “give this to Radhakrishanan”.
Expressing solidarity with the journalists who are protesting against Radhakrishnan, the Network of Women in Media, India (NWMI), has decided to hand over a letter to Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, demanding action against the man. As of now, the letter has been signed by more than 100 women media persons from Kerala.
Journalists have also raised objections against the current Internal Committee of the Thiruvananthapuram Press Club as it is not constituted as per the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act. Per rules, the committee should be headed by a senior woman in an organisation and at least 50 per cent of the members on the panel should be women. However, the current Internal Committee of the Thiruvananthapuram Press Club has been constituted without the knowledge of its members.
The woman journalists have also demanded that the Press Club president, Sonichan, be excluded from the new committee, as he falsely said in an interview that the issue has been resolved. A letter in this regard has also been sent to the Press Club officials.
According to the journalists who held the protest, the office bearers of the Press Club have not given a positive reply to their demands. “Instead, the president of the Press Club questioned us for protesting,” said one of the journalists.
Meanwhile, the Kerala State Women's Commission has taken suo motu cognisance of the case. The Commission will also direct the City Police Commissioner to submit a report in the incident. The Commission has also stated that it will look into whether media firms in the state have an Internal Committee.