India Today sacks GM Indranil Chatterjee over his Adivasi remarks against President-elect Draupadi Murmu

New Delhi, July 22: India Today Group on Friday sacked its Kolkata-based Dy General Manager Indranil Chatterjee over an offensive and derogatory post made against president-elect Droupadi Murmu. Chatterjee made the comments on his personal Facebook account on Thursday.

 

 

The media group expressed regret for the ‘extremely derogatory post’ by their Kolkata based sales staff, saying that the post was hurtful and against the basic principles of human decency.

 

 

A facebook post by Indranil Chatterjee had gone viral yesterday. He said that he can’t accept Draupadi Murmu as India’s president because she is Adivasi. Called himself as a old fashioned and is proud of it, he said that just like does not support gay marriage, he also does not support an ‘Adivasi President’.

 

He had written, “Few chairs are not meant for “All” & have a dignity attached to them. Do we allow a sweeper to perform Durga Puja? Can a Hindu teach at a Madrasah? These are nothing but cheap socio-political gimmicks of the ruling party in creating a Rubber Stamp Constitutional Head, so that laws can be passed easily showing middle finger to the Opposition parties.”

 

 

Making even worse comments, Indranil Chatterjee added that election of Draupadi Murmu to the post of president of India is an insult to past presidents like souls like APJ Abdul Kalam, Pranab MuKherjee, S. Radhakrishnan, Zakir Hussain, Dr. Shankar Dayal Sharma, Rajendra Prasad and others. “Baba Indra is against Medieval Age Caste Politics. Strictly my personal opinion,” he had added at the last.

 

When the post of Indranil went viral, he deleted his Facebook account. The media group as well as him received massive outrage on the social media. Following the outrage, India Today group sacked him.

 

In a statement, India Today Group Chief Executive Officer Dinesh Bhatia, said, "We regret to bring to your attention that last night a member of our Kolkata sales staff put out an extremely derogatory post on his personal Facebook account. The post was hurtful and against the basic principles of human decency."

 

 

"When asked for an explanation, the employee admitted to his momentary lapse of judgement. He apologized unconditionally and said he had already deleted the post within a few minutes. However, this was a grave breach of the India Today Group's Code of Conduct. The employee's services were terminated with immediate effect last night," he said.

 

Further, he added, "The India Today Group does not condone such actions. We uphold the highest standards of ethics and professional decorum."

 

Notably, Draupadi Murmu won the presidential election over Yashwant Sinha on Thursday to become the country’s next president. She is the first tribal woman to become the President of India. She was also the first female governor of the state.