Journalists assaulted, sexually harassed in Delhi; 'attacked' by cops in Bengaluru

New Delhi: Three journalists working with The Caravan were assaulted in Subhash Mohalla in northeast Delhi’s North Ghonda neighbourhood on Tuesday. The journalists had gone there to report on a story.

As per the FIR filed by Shahid Tantray, Prabhjit Singh and a woman journalist, they were under attack for over one and a half hours. They were subjected to communal slurs, threatened with murder, and sexually harassed.

According to a report filed by The Caravan, the journalists were taking photographs of saffron flags that had been tied in the area, when some men approached them and told them to stop. One of the men, identified himself as a “BJP general secretary”.

The woman journalist faced sexual harassment from a middle-aged man who exposed himself to her. Later, the mob attacked her as well. “A middle-aged man in a dhoti and a white T-shirt, with a bald head and a slim pony-tail stood in front of me,” the woman journalist said in her complaint. “He then opened his dhoti and exposed his genitals while looking at me. He proceeded to shake his penis with his hand and started making objectionable and lewd expressions, while laughing at me,” she wrote.

The attack began around 2 pm, when a mob of locals—men and women—surrounded the journalists, and then began assaulting them.

Meanwhile, in Bangalore, at least 4 journalists from India Today, The News Minute and Suvarna News 24×7 were allegedly attacked by the Bangalore City police while reporting the vandalism and police shootings that killed three people.

Nolan Pinto of India Today took to twitter to report the incident, “@CPBlr your police hit my head with a pole even though we kept yelling we are reporters. @prajwalmanipal was hit on the back. We had to run from your police to save ourselves when there was no mob present.”