India is buzzing with news of some high-profile people in many industries, particularly in the show business and media, caught in the headlights of the speeding #MeToo movement. It has been a year that the campaign to out the powerful men took off in America. The feminist movement has taken wings and flying into many directions. It has hit India with a thunderbolt unlikely seen in the recent past. Each day, more skeletons from the cupboards of men in power are falling out. It’s unlikely to end soon.
A conservative society such as India has suddenly gained notoriety because of some men who yielded lot of power then and even now in Bollywood and in media. That a junior minister in the Modi cabinet was been allegedly accused of sexual misdeamours is the hot topic of the day. A former shining star in the firmament of India’s media, MJ Akbar, who switched from journalism to politics and jumped from the Congress into the BJP, has now taken recourse to the judicial courts to clear his name from allegations by more than ten female journalists, most of them who worked under him.
No doubt, Akbar has chosen to defend himself and have engaged a battery of lawyers to fight Priya Ramani, the journalist who delivered the first blow, and has vowed to fight Akbar. It could be a nasty affair. It won’t be easy for Akbar as more women are ready to testify against him. A banner headline is in the works. Obviously, the BJP pushed for his exit, as the party wouldn’t want to go into the 2019 election with such an ugly baggage.
Another media mega-star, Tarun Tejpal, is in the throes of judicial hell for raping a junior reporter in a hotel elevator in Goa. Goa has seen a rise in rapes but, if memory serves me right, the veteran journalist Mario Cabral e Sa had painted Goa as “rape capital” of India in his report for Blitz in the 70s. Nothing has come out of a rape charge against a former Goa minister. Tejpal’s case has been lingering for about five years. The wheels of justice grinds slowly in India.
One is never certain of the verdict, just as one verdict in Toronto surprised not just me but many who were following the case closely. It concerns a top star of the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC), Jian Ghomeshi, a radio host. He was acquitted of four counts of sexual assault in a sensational trial/ He was represented by a woman lawyer Marie Henein, who was later fiercely disparaged by women’s groups for having betrayed the women’s cause. Akbar’s lead lawyer is also a woman, Geetha Luthra, who already has her hands full with Tejpal’s case.
I have worked with Akbar at the Free Press Journal, where he edited the Sunday paper, Bharat Jyoti. But as he grew in stature and power, moving from one paper to another, he gained a reputation few other editors have achieved. I have read some of his books and would regular read his column, Byline. Women’s “whisper network” hadn’t singled anyone.
I have watched the American Senate proceedings regarding the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. Despite the solid testimony of the accuser, it seems political considerations by the Republicans provided the needed support to Trump’s nominee. In this age of Donald Trump, one can expect such people to come to power, as the president himself has proved to be low on morals. His attacks on some women, especially the TV anchor, Megan Kelly, have been vicious and have cast a pall on the presidency.
On the anniversary of the #MeToo movement, I watched Taruna Burke, its founder, talk of women’s revolution and how women have benefitted from it. No wonder Time magazine voted it “The Person of the Year” for 2017. This widespread movement that has shaken the male-dominated bastions.
It brings back memories of the 60s when the feminist movement moved into a fast gear. The notable names that come to mind are of Betty Friedman, whose book, The Feminine Mystique, was a runaway bestseller, and Gloria Steimen, a staunch journalist and feminist activist who stated, “This is no simple reform. It really is a revolution…” Later on came Germaine Greer, the feisty Australian, whose book, The Female Eunuch, was a delight to read.
In this debate of “gender equality” and “women empowerment”, I have been going over a book, That’s What She Said— What Men Need to Know (And Women Need to Tell Them) About Working Together, by Joanne Lipman, a former editor-in-chief of USA Today. It’s a timely book. It has an interesting chapter, We’re All a Little Bit Sexist. She talks of “unconscious bias” and “gender-blind” ideals, and quotes researchers that “the only thing women achieved by talking like men was making people hate them.” Both men and women need to work together to close the gap.
(Eugene Correia is a senior journalist who worked with Free Press Journal, and The Hindu)
