NEW DELHI: Days after a woman journalist alleged that she had been sexually assaulted by an Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP), the officer was promoted to the post of Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (Addl DCP).
In an order issued on Monday, a total of 12 DANIPS officers, including ACP Vivek Bhagat, were promoted to the post of Addl DCP.
Bhagat, a 2018-batch DANIPS officer, is currently posted as the ACP of Connaught Place.
On Saturday, a woman journalist alleged that an Assistant Commissioner of Police had sexually assaulted her. “I asked ACP Vivek Bhagat of the Delhi Police about the absence of women police personnel, following which he sexually assaulted me and pushed me back,” she alleged.
Scores of journalists staged a protest outside Parliament Street Police Station on Sunday, demanding the registration of an FIR over sexual harassment complaints filed by three women journalists against Delhi Police personnel.
According to the police, they have received the complaints and transferred them to the Crime Branch for a fair and impartial inquiry.
“On 03-10-26, during the protest in the New Delhi area, while the law-and-order situation was being handled, allegations of sexual harassment were made by three female journalists against police officers. New Delhi District has received their complaints and the same have been transferred to the Crime Branch for a fair and impartial inquiry,” the police said in a post on social media platform X.
In another post, marked as an official clarification, the police on Monday evening said some social media accounts were claiming that female protesters had been subjected to physical assault.
“These allegations are baseless and misleading. Female protesters are handled by female staff and are treated with dignity and due regard. Detentions and releases are carried out in accordance with applicable law and prescribed procedures. Male protesters who were detained were released within the stipulated time period, following due process of law. Any claim suggesting otherwise is factually incorrect and does not reflect the actual sequence of events,” the police said.
Members of the Congress, AAP and CJP joined the journalists’ protest after the women alleged that they had been sexually harassed by police personnel while protesters were being detained at Jantar Mantar during Saturday’s agitation against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. They alleged that no women police personnel were present at the spot.
Meanwhile, the Press Club of India said in a statement that it was “shocked and dismayed” by the Delhi Police’s actions and treatment of journalists during protests at Jantar Mantar against the Chief Election Commissioner on Friday and Saturday.
“Behaviour of this kind cannot be normalised in a democracy,” it said.
“Journalists must be allowed to work freely, without fear, and document those who gather to raise various issues. That this is not being allowed even at the heart of the national capital does not bode well for the trajectory of media freedom in India,” the statement added.