TCN News
Delhi : Fatima Nafees, mother of missing JNU student Najeeb Ahmed, has sent legal notices to Times of India (TOI) and other prominent electronic news media outlets for falsely reporting that her son, Najeeb Ahmed, has ISIS links, or was looking for ways to join ISIS.
The issue pertains to a baseless front page report by TOI in its national edition dated March 21, 2017 that made various damaging assertions regarding Najeeb Ahmed’s Google and YouTube search history – all of which were categorically refuted by the Delhi Police on the same day, that is March 21, 2017.
On March 22, 2017, Fatima Nafees held a press conference in Delhi asking the media outlets which reproduced this news to apologize unconditionally. She slammed TOI for defaming her family’s reputation with such deliberate and malicious reportage. In the press conference, Ms. Fatima Nafees made some observations on the role of the media. She said that while the job of the media was to help me find my son by raising awareness about the issue, they are, instead, spreading false propaganda.
She appealed to the media to withdraw the story and apologize. However, there was no response from TOI. On March 22, 2017 itself, the DCP of Delhi Police wrote a rejoinder in TOI, which was published on page 5 of its Delhi edition in a small box. In the rejoinder, the Delhi Police clearly said that the investigating authority that is probing Najeeb’s disappearance never even sought Najeeb’s search history from Google, and that there is no basis to the reports that he viewed content related to ISIS!.
Despite all this, TOI did not apologized for the fake story, nor has any action been taken against the reporter who planted the fake story. The fake story continues to be on the TOI website and is being widely shared by BJP and RSS leaders across social media platforms. The story itself does not even contain a note that the story is false and unfounded.
A petition asking the TOI to apologize on the front page has recorded more than 7,500 signatures
Fatima Nafees, through her counsel, Vrinda Grover has now sent legal notices to Times of India, Times Now, Zee News and Delhi Aajtak asking them to:
- Apologize for the damaging and defamatory reportage for one week, prominently through their channels. The legal notice to TOI demands that an apology be carried on the front page for seven continuous days.
- Retract the story and ensure that it is taken down from all of their portals, social media accounts, websites, etc.
- Issue one tweet every two hours for seven days from Twitter accounts, apologizing for the false story and admitting that it was baseless.
If the media houses fail to take these corrective measures, Fatima Nafees will initiate criminal proceedings against them.
Mohit Pandey, JNUSU President,said, “We reiterates these demands, we also demand that proper action be taken against the journalist, Rajshekhar Jha who planted the fake news. We also demand that TOI should monetarily compensate the poor family which has been fighting the case against the disappearance of their son, without any monetary support from any quarter.”