LAHORE: A woman journalist on Tuesday admitted before a court that she was in contact with singer Meesha Shafi and had already taken her statement before publishing a news story about her allegations of sexual harassment against actor-cum-singer Ali Zafar after the singer made tweets.

“However, I never committed to her (Shafi) publishing anything and it was only published when it became news in the public domain,” said Hamna Zubair, the journalist, during her cross-examination in a defamation suit by Mr Zafar against Ms Shafi.

The journalist, who is a witness of Shafi, also admitted that she had contacted Zafar for his version but did not wait for the response of his team’s statement before publishing her article on an English newspaper website, however, incorporated the same in the article as soon as she got it. She admitted that the article was posted five minutes after she contacted the plaintiff for his rebuttal.

Ms Zubair said it was correct that after the allegations of Shafi against Zafar people knew that he had been accused of sexual harassment and some of them might have believed that he was a harasser.

The court allowed the witness to present some of her tweets regarding other cases of sexual harassment.

The journalist said it was correct that the plaintiff had filed a complaint against her before the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA): however, did not know the details as she never received any notice from the agency.

As the cross-examination completed, Additional District & Sessions Judge Azhar Iqbal Ranjha adjourned further hearing till Sept 9.

Ali Zafar filed the suit against Meesha Shafi for leveling allegations of sexual harassment on him. He said the allegations had tarnished his image in public while his family had been facing agony and pain. He asked the court to issue a decree against Ms Shafi and direct her to pay Rs1bn as damages to him.

Published in Dawn, July 27th, 2021