Local journalists, politicians, and activists have decried the Indian government's silence after female reporters were excluded from a press event with the Afghan Taliban foreign minister in Delhi.
Approximately 16 male reporters were allowed to attend the October event, according to BBC News. The reporters witnessed women and foreign media being turned away from the event with FM Amir Khan Muttaqi.
A Taliban source confirmed to the BBC News that women had deliberately not been invited to the event.
"Female journalists were excluded due to a lack of proper coordination and will be invited to the next conference if held in Delhi," the source claimed.
India's External Affairs Ministry said it "had no involvement in the press interaction" at the Afghan embassy.
Condemning the Indian government for allowing the event
Female politician Priyanka Gandhi Vadra wrote, “Prime Minister @narendramodi ji, please clarify your position on the removal of female journalists from the press conference of the representative of the Taliban on his visit to India.
“If your recognition of women’s rights isn’t just convenient posturing from one election to the other, then how has this insult to some of India’s most competent women been allowed in our country, a country whose women are its backbone and its pride.”
Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi slammed India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi for letting the event go ahead, claiming the exclusionary event was "telling every woman in India that you are too weak to stand up for them."
Gandhi added on social media, "In our country, women have the right to equal participation in every space."
The Editors Guild of India strongly condemned the exclusion and said, "Whether or not the MEA coordinated the event, it is deeply troubling that such a discriminatory exclusion was allowed to proceed without objection."