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Caravan Reporters Allege Assault And Sexual Harassment In Northeast Delhi

Three journalists from The Caravan magazine say they were physically assaulted by a mob in Subhash Mohalla in northeast-Delhi on Tuesday.
Journalists hold candles and placards during a candlelight vigil against police brutalities and attacks on press freedom in Mumbai, India December 26, 2019. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas
Francis Mascarenhas / reuters
Journalists hold candles and placards during a candlelight vigil against police brutalities and attacks on press freedom in Mumbai, India December 26, 2019. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas

NEW DELHI —Three journalists from The Caravan magazine say they were physically assaulted by a mob in Subhash Mohalla in northeast-Delhi on Tuesday afternoon.

At 11:52 pm on Tuesday, Hartosh Singh Bal, political editor of The Caravan, tweeted that despite two detailed complaints on assault and sexual harassment by The Caravan reporters, no FIR was registered.

On Wednesday morning, Bal told HuffPost India that the Delhi Police had not informed them of an FIR in the matter.

A senior police official in northeast Delhi, Ved Prakash Surya, told The Indian Express, “They had gone to report on a story and people in the area got annoyed. Police safely evacuated the three. We got reports they were manhandled but nobody has suffered any major injuries. We will do an inquiry before filing an FIR.”

Vinod Jose, Executive Editor of The Caravan, told HuffPost India that the reporters who were targeted on Tuesday have been contributing to the publication’s coverage of the Delhi Riots.

“They were told to go back and stop reporting from there,” Jose said. “Caravan has been consistently at it in terms of reporting on the Delhi Riots and the targeted violence. The stories were revealing names including one or two parliamentarians and police officers.”

A Twitter thread, put out by the New Delhi-based magazine at 12:01 am on Wednesday, said a mob “physically assaulted its staffers, threatened to kill them, and used communal slurs,” and “one among the mob, dressed in a saffron kurta, claimed he was the ‘BJP general secretary. ’”

Two reporters were identified as Prabhjit Singh and Shahid Tantray.

In his complaint to the Delhi Police, Prabhjit Singh, wrote that were he not present, “the mob led by that saffron-clad man would have lynched Shahid for his Muslim identity.”

The woman reporter was sexually harassed, The Caravan said.

After she managed to escape into a gully, The Caravan said, “Here, young men surrounded her and took her pictures and videos without her consent, and verbally harassed her. A middle-aged man exposed his genitals to her, shook his penis and made lewd facial expressions at her.”

Local police personnel took the journalists to a nearby station in Bhajanpura.

“As the woman staffer ran and attempted to reach the Bhajanpur station, the mob attacked her again. The attackers beat her on the head, arms, hips and chest. The man in the saffron kurta was among them, as were two women,” The Caravan said.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.