Following sexual assault allegations from Jami Mahmood, the Chief Executive of Dawn Media Group Hameed Haroon has sent the filmmaker a legal notice. The notice claims Jami’s story about rape is a ploy to malign Hameed, and part of a scheme to target press freedom.
The Dawn CEO sent a legal notice under Section 8 of the Defamation Ordinance, 2002, asking for an unconditional public apology and retraction of rape allegations. The notice was sent through his attorney.
Jami revealed that he had received the notice and was in the process of reading through it. However, he said that an apology was not ‘even a distant possibility’. He added that he had addressed many ‘points raised in Haroon’s notice‘ in his previous posts on social media.
“There is a lot that needs to be done for victims of sexual harassment and for future victims,”
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According to the notice, unless Jami circulates an unconditional public apology and issues a public statement retracting his rape claims from all social media posts and other media outlets within 14 days of the receipt of this notice, Hameed Haroon reserves the right to initiate civil and criminal legal proceedings against the director under Section 499 of the Pakistan Penal Code, 1860, and the Defamation Ordinance, 2002, and other applicable laws.
Rape Claims Target Press Freedom?
The notice then referred to the series of attacks on the Dawn Media Group in December. Mobs besieged Dawn Media’s offices in Islamabad and Karachi when they had published the cultural origins of the London Bridge attacker, Usman Khan.
The notice sent to Jami however highlights that;
“Some members of this mob had pictures/posters of our client which made specific reference to the false rape allegations being made by you”.
Further, the notice claimed Jami had ‘falsely and maliciously labeled‘ Hameed Haroon as a rapist.
“That almost two months after circulating your first tweet on being allegedly raped, and strangely and abruptly travelling outside Pakistan, on December 28, 2019 on the social media platform Twitter, you falsely and maliciously labelled our client as an alleged rapist.”
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This was followed by further claims that Jami is propagating false accusations.
“Since then, you have been continuing to circulate this false allegation all over Pakistan, including Karachi and abroad. Our client categorically denies that he has ever perpetrated sexual assault on anyone and categorically denies that he has raped you,”
The notice even designated these allegations as a ploy by ‘powerful interests in the state and society‘ against press freedom.
“This false and malicious allegation has been levelled at the instigation of powerful interests in the state and society who, for their own motives and the promotion of their own repressive narrative, wish to destroy our client’s credibility, especially his credibility as a leading advocate of the freedom of the press.”
The notice terms the allegation “a false statement […] to target the freedom of the press”.
Jami Mahmood’s #MeToo Story
When famed filmmaker Jamshed Mahmood AKA Jami first came forth with his sexual assault story a month ago, he shared that he had been raped by a ‘media tycoon‘ 13 years ago and on December 28.
Initially, he didn’t name the rapist but shared that they used to be friends. Later he named Haroon as his alleged rapist.
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In response, Hameed Haroon issued a statement categorically rejecting the rape accusations and threatened legal action.
That legal notice was sent to Jami on Monday. The four-page-long legal notice is addressed to Jami’s office in Karachi. The notice addresses how in Jami’s tweets from October 20;
“the alleged rapist was never specifically named, even though hints and innuendos were dropped from time to time that could conceivably be taken as suggesting that the alleged rapist was our client [Haroon]”.
More Claims Against Hameed Haroon
More people are coming forth with sexual harassment claims against Haroon on social media.
Thank you @azadjami1 for giving me the courage to speak about it. Though I left #hameedharoon place before he could do anything else, I can still feel what you must've gone through. More power to you! https://t.co/yMrRWdhoRE
— Adeel Ahmed (@adeelahmedzafar) January 6, 2020
All the victims are male and have worked with the Dawn CEO in some capacity.
https://twitter.com/azadjami1/status/1214214578793537537
It remains to be seen whether more victims will come forward. Nevertheless, the chorus of allegations against Dawn’s CEO is taking a serious turn. It is hoped that an impartial inquiry is carried out and the matter thoroughly investigated.
