A Newspaper Suggested We Go Easy On Tarun Tejpal And Twitter Took No Time To Set Things Straight

Tejpal was charged with sexually assaulting a co-worker, which "Mid-Day" described today as simply "a grave error".

In November 2013, Tehelka founder Tarun Tejpal was accused and arrested on charges of sexually assaulting a co-worker.

Strdel / AFP / Getty Images

He was let out on bail in July 2014, but not before receiving huge backlash in the media and the massive coverage that the case got.

On June 9, Mid-Day published this article titled "Time for a RE-THINK?" that questioned whether the response to the allegations had been too harsh, and deemed his alleged crimes just a "grave error".

Mid-Day

The article did not go down well with a LOT of people, who made their displeasure known.

Aditya Raj Kaul @AdityaRajKaul

Rape committed by Tarun Tejpal is suddenly just a 'grave error' for 'liberal voices'. Excuse me. Rapist is a Rapist.

06:08 AM - 09 Jun 2016

Everyone, including journalists from other publications, called out the paper for trying to temper public anger against a sex offender.

Twitter: @priyaramani

Twitter: @RootKanal

Thousands of people piled on and made sure that any insensitive conversations around the case were shut down...

Peter Griffin @zigzackly

Fixed that for you.

08:03 AM - 09 Jun 2016

And that there are no excuses for rape, no matter who you are.

Twitter: @search

This incident comes in the midst of worldwide outrage – including among Indians – over a shortened 6-month jail sentence given to a student who raped a woman on Stanford's campus.

AP

The judge deemed that a lengthy sentence would “have a severe impact” on him, which launched a global conversation about how far society goes to protect men from the impacts of their crimes, rather than to protect women from those crimes to begin with.