Influential South Asian peer bullied woman journalist, U.K. House of Lords probe finds

An influential member of the South Asian diaspora and a Conservative Party donor, Rami Ranger, bullied a female journalist and campaigner for women’s rights, a U.K. House of Lords probe concluded. The inquiry was based on a 2022 complaint by an Indian origin journalist, Poonam Joshi, who had alleged that Mr. Ranger had bullied her in person and on social media after she criticised an organisation , Hindu forum of Britain (HFB), with which Mr. Ranger is associated. 

The U.K. House of Lord’s Commissioner for Standards, Akbar Khan, said in his report that “on the balance of probabilities” Lord Ranger’s conduct “did constitute bullying against Ms. Joshi” and breached the code of conduct. Mr. Ranger, who was made a peer in 2019,  has apologised and agreed to attend training with regard to his conduct.

The news comes weeks after Tory MP Dominic Raab resigned from his post as the country’s Deputy Prime Minister for behaviour that was termed  “unreasonably aggressive” by an inquiry.

The Lords report said that there was a power imbalance between Mr. Ranger and Ms. Joshi and that Mr. Ranger “ was acutely aware of this imbalance of power and abused it by persistently undermining, humiliating and denigrating Ms. Joshi”.  

Ms. Joshi told the Commissioner that Mr. Ranger’s actions had impacted her and her family significantly. Mr. Ranger, as per tweets in the report,  had called Ms. Joshi “ filth and garbage”.

“You have a big mouth. Now shut it,” he said in another tweet.

Ms. Joshi , who runs an organisation to help Indian women migrants who are victims of domestic abuse in the U.K., said in her complaint that she had taken issue with  HFB’s promotion of the so-called “god man” Nithyananda at its 2022 Deepavali event. The event was attended by Nithyananda’s U.K. representative.

Nithyananda is a fugitive and wanted by the law in India on rape and child abduction charges. Mr. Ranger told the Commissioner that Ms. Joshi’s objections to HFB were “longstanding”.

Mr. Ranger had told the Observer newspaper in December that he would not have attended the HFB event if he knew that such “unsavoury characters” (i.e., Nithyananda) were being promoted.

“In the light of the findings I recommend that Lord Ranger apologise to Ms Poonam Joshi about his conduct and undertake bespoke training and behaviour change coaching,” the Commissioner said.  He also said that he encouraged Ms. Joshi to tender an apology to Mr. Ranger “in recognition that they both bear a measure of responsibility” for the circumstances.

During the probe, Mr. Ranger had said that Ms. Joshi’s “barrage” of untrue and “defamatory” tweets had reputational impacts on him that led him to fear for his and his family’s wellbeing. Mr. Ranger had also filed a defamation suit against Ms. Joshi. The suit has been settled on confidential terms , Ms. Joshi told The Hindu on Tuesday.

In a statement on Twitter, Ms. Joshi called the outcome a “just finding” and said that she had received an apology from Mr. Ranger and noted that he had agreed to take a behavioural correction course and that she had “reciprocated” this with an apology of her own.

The Foreign Press Association (with which The Hindu is also associated) tweeted its support for Ms. Joshi, saying, “Insulting, bullying and belittling journalists is unacceptable.”