MJ Akbar raped me, says US-based scribe

New Delhi: Former Union minister and the BJP’s Rajya Sabha MP, M.J. Akbar, already reeling under a series of allegations of sexual assault by nearly 20 women was accused of “rape” by a former employee, Pallavi Gogoi. The woman, now a US citizen, accused Mr Akbar of “raping and assaulting” her 23 years ago, when he was the editor of The Asian Age.

Denying the charge, Mr Akbar issued a statement saying, “Pallavi Gogoi and I entered into a consensual relationship that spanned several months… This relationship (with Gogoi) gave rise to talk and would later cause significant strife in my home life as well. This consensual relationship ended, perhaps not on the best note.”

Mr Akbar’s wife also came out in her husband’s defence and told a news agency, “Tushita Patel and Pallavi Gogoi were often at our home, neither carried the haunted look of victims of sexual assault.” Ms Patel, another former employee, has also accused Mr Akbar of “sexual harassment”.

In her statement, Mrs Akbar said, “More than 20 years ago, Pallavi Gogoi caused unhappiness and discord in our home. I learned of her and my husband’s involvement through her late night phone calls and her public display of affection in my presence… “I don’t know Pallavi’s reasons for telling this lie but a lie it is.”  

Detailing incidents of sexual assault, Ms Gogoi in an article in the Washington Post wrote, “The M.J. Akbar I knew — editor in chief of the Asian Age newspaper — was a brilliant journalist. He also used his position to prey on me”.

“Why didn’t I fight him then? I was always a fighter in all other aspects of my life. I cannot explain today how and why he had such power over me, why I succumbed. Was it because he was so much more powerful than I was? Was it because I didn’t know how to handle a situation that I never imagined possible with someone who was not supposed to do that? Was it because I was afraid of losing my job? And how to explain that to my honest parents, who lived far away? I just know that I hated myself then. And I died a little every day.”

Ms Gogoi, now the chief business editor of National Public Radio (NPR), a Washington-based American media organisation, wrote, “It must have been late spring or summer of 1994, and I had gone into his office — his door was often closed. I went to show him the op-ed page I had created with what I thought were clever headlines. He applauded my effort and suddenly lunged to kiss me. I reeled. I emerged from the office, red-faced, confused, ashamed, destroyed.”

The second incident was a few months later when she was summoned to Mumbai to help launch a magazine, she claimed.

“He called me to his room at the fancy Taj hotel, again to see the layouts. When he again came close to me to kiss me, I fought him and pushed him away. He scratched my face as I ran away, tears streaming down. That evening, I explained the scratches to a friend by telling her I had slipped and fallen at the hotel,” she wrote in the Post.

When she got back to Delhi, Mr Akbar threatened to kick her out of the job if she resisted him again. But she didn’t quit the paper, she said.

One story took her to a remote village a few hundred miles from Delhi and the assignment was to end in Jaipur. When she checked back, Mr Akbar said she could come discuss the story in his hotel in Jaipur.

“In his hotel room, even though I fought him, he was physically more powerful. He ripped off my clothes and raped me,” she alleged, adding that instead of reporting him to the police, she was filled with shame.

Ms Gogoi claimed that Mr Akbar’s grip over her got tighter. For a few months, he continued to defile her sexually, verbally, emotionally. He would burst into loud rages in the newsroom if he saw her talking to male colleagues. It was frightening.

“I cannot explain today how and why he had such power over me, why I succumbed. Was it because I was afraid of losing my job? I just know that I hated myself then. And I died a little every day,” she said.

Ms Gogoi alleged that Mr Akbar once worked himself into a rage in the London office after he saw her talking to a male colleague. He hit her and went on a rampage, throwing things from the desk at her — a pair of scissors or whatever he could get his hands on. She ran away and hid in Hyde Park. “I was in shreds — emotionally, physically, mentally,” she said.

When Mr Akbar summoned her back to Mumbai she fled to the US, without a job or a place to stay in.

Meanwhile, the Editors Guild of India Friday said it is tracking the fresh allegations of sexual misconduct against the former editor with “great concern” and a decision on his membership of the top editors’ body will be taken after “due process” is completed.

Mr Akbar is a past president and continues to be a member of the Guild.