On Tuesday, May 9, Dalit ‘activist’ and YouTuber Ved Prakash published a Facebook post in which he issued an apology to a ‘Brahmin’ editor at BBC India for falsely accusing her of sacking a Dalit journalist from her job due to her caste. The ‘activist’ who has over 14 lakh subscribers on his YouTube channel has apologized to the Brahmin journalist to get relief from a case filed by BBC’s India Head Rupa Jha.
According to the apology issued by Ved Prakash on Facebook on May 9, the matter dates four years back when a Dalit woman named Meena Kotwal and her husband Raja Pandey contacted Ved Prakash and said that Meena Kotwal worked at BBC, however, she claimed that she faced injustice there and was expelled from her job as she is Dalit.
Following this, as narrated by Ved Prakash, being a Dalit activist and journalist, he published a news post about the matter wherein he held Rupa Jha, the Indian language head of BBC, responsible for the alleged caste discrimination faced by Meena Kotwal. He added that the language of the news he published was not “appropriate” and people hurled abuses in reaction to the said post.
BBC’s Rupa Jha then filed a case at Delhi’s Barakhamba Police Station. During the investigation, the police asked Ved Prakash to call Meena Kotwal to furnish evidence proving the claim that she was sacked from her post at BBC due to caste discrimination. Kotwal and her husband, however, refused to provide any evidence backing their claim.
“Later on, I got to know that Meena Kotwal had a one-year contract only at BBC. She was relieved from her post as the contract ended,” Ved Prakash wrote in his Facebook post.
He added that Kotwal and her husband even refused to become his guarantor for his bail. For the last four years, the case proceedings continued, however, on May 9, 2023, Ved Prakash and Rupa Jha mutually decided to close the case.
“Due to the post I published on the basis of the false information provided by Meena Kotwal and her husband Raja Pandey as well as the abusive response to it has caused hurt to Rupa Jha and I apologise for the same and express regret,” Ved Prakash added.
He also shared two pictures, one with Meena Kotwal and the other with Rupa Jha. It is notable that Meena Kotwal founded an online portal named ‘The Mooknayak’ and has worked with leftist propaganda portals The Wire and The Print.
He thanked Dalit activist and advocate Sujit Samrat for representing him in the court free of charge, and also thanked one Prem Prakash Chaudhary for becoming his guarantor for bail.