My attacker was Indian, says victim of 'racist' assault

Natasha Robinson and Amanda Hodge | July 29, 2009
Article from: The Australian

AN undercover reporter assaulted after covertly exposing migration scams says she is sickened by Indian media claims that she was targeted in a racist attack, insisting her tormentor was a fellow Indian.

As the Indian media's response to the dangers faced by Indian students and migrants to Australia reached a new level of hysteria yesterday with Kevin Rudd called a racist, the undercover reporter said Indian commentators had "no right to speak" because their own country was classist and racist.

"I'm just very, very appalled with the Indian media assuming that this was a racist attack," said the reporter, a 28-year-old long-time resident of Australia who covertly exposed migration scams for ABC TV's Four Corners.

"It was absolutely not. My attacker looked like an Indian person and I was threatened in Hindi."

The reporter, who had previously received two threatening telephone calls, was attacked in an inner-city Sydney street on Saturday afternoon when a man wearing a turban came at her with an "almighty elbow to the right shoulder".

The young woman had gone undercover for Four Corners during an investigation that aired on Monday night, exposing widespread corruption within the international student and migration sectors.

The Indian media seized on the reporter's attack and during a special half-hour edition of its popular News Hour program, entitled "Yes, It's Racism", top-rating Indian news channel Times Now claimed the assault was racially motivated.

But the reporter angrily disputed this, saying India was a far more racist country than Australia.

"I know it was not a racially motivated attack," she said. "Most sane Indian students in Sydney and Melbourne don't think these are racist-motivated attacks at all.

"Every country has a bit of racism here and there. And really, with the classist system in India, we have no right to speak. Certainly we have way more racism in our country than here in Australia."