The Network of Women in Media, India, has called for news organisations and journalism colleges to set up suo motu inquiries into those accused of sexual misconduct on social media in the past few days. The group urged the media to “shine the light” on itself and break the “entrenched impunity” for harassers at the workplace.

In a statement on Monday, the group called the ongoing #MeToo allegations on social media a “watershed moment” for journalism. Since Friday, several women have made allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct against various journalists, media professionals and writers on social media. Those accused include senior editors as well as reporters.

The Network of Women in Media, India, demanded that media groups and colleges set up internal committees to handle complaints of sexual harassment, circulate their policies on the subject to employees and also put them up on their websites.

The group condemned the “rampant sexism and misogyny” in Indian newsrooms and encouraged more women to “document their accounts without fear or inhibitions”. It also urged the media to follow up on such cases. “Instead of burying the story, big media/legacy organisations should follow up these stories in terms of reports with due diligence,” the statement said.

The Indian Women’s Press Corps also issued a statement on Monday, calling upon media houses to establish institutional mechanisms to redress complaints of sexual harassment, PTI reported. The group’s president, TK Rajalakshmi, said that it was disturbing and a “matter of grave concern” that “many of the complaints have gone unheard despite being brought to the notice of the appropriate authorities”.

Rajalakshmi also said media organisations have a legal obligation to set up internal complaints committees at every branch office and give information about what constitutes sexual harassment. The complaints are coming out through social media because of “either the absence or the abject failure of robust institutional grievance redress mechanisms that ought to have been readily available to the complainants in the first place”, she said.

Here is the full text of the statement by Network of Women in Media: