BBC presenter Nihal Arthanayake – who posted a shocking video about being racially abused in Manchester last week – has now reported the incident to police.
The BBC 5 Live presenter is said to have visited a police station yesterday.
Nihal confirmed this, saying on social media: "I wasn't going to report it to the police but my mate said that I should and now I have."
In another post, he said: “Impressed that @gmpolice have already been in touch. Looking at investigating a Racially Aggravated Public Order Offence.”
But he stopped short of publicly revealing certain details of the incident, which happened outside a pub Altrincham as he waited for his wife.
“I won’t be mentioning the name of the pub because I had a great time in there before encountering that racist man,” the 51-year-old said. "Pubs are finding it hard enough as it is to stay open without being stained unfairly.”
Taking to Twitter last week to share shocking details of what had happened to him, Nihal said he was asked if he was a doctor before being called a p*** and then the N-word.
He told his 115,000 followers in a video message: “So, last night this happened to me and I am still trying to process the weirdness of it. Warning there is bad language.”
“So I don’t really know what just happened. I was in a place called Altrincham, which is a bit of a hole.
“And I was in this pub which I’d been in with my wife, dancing around, jumping around etc. It’s fun. Covers band, they were very good.
“I saw this man sitting outside. I was waiting for my wife to come out. So I said, ‘Can I come and sit with you, can we talk?’ He was like ‘Yeah, yeah, absolutely’. Little kind of drunk man.”
But Nihal revealed the conversation quickly turned abusive with what the man to him said next.
He continued: “We got talking and he said, ‘Are you a doctor?’ So I started laughing, because as an Asian it’s the kind of question you might get asked. And I went, ‘Why would you ask that?’
“And he said ‘because you’re a p***’. Then he went ‘I guess I can’t say p***’. Then he said the N-word.
“Then he kind of looked at me and was like, ‘Oh sorry, you’re offended aren’t you’. And I said, ‘Well why did you say that word, why did you need to say that word?’
“He said, ‘Oh I’m sorry, I’m a massive C word.
“I said you’re not a massive C word, you’re just an average one. Dictators are massive C words, you’re just an average one. It was so weird.
“But you know, when you come to some of these areas, I think there are just some people who feel they can still say that word. Like what?!”
Since posting the video, which has already been viewed over 200,000 times, Nihal has been inundated with messages of support from friends and fans.
But although the response was mainly positive, he revealed he had also faced a further outpouring of racist abuse from vile Twitter trolls.
Nihal said he had gone public with the incident as: “I believe in exposing them so we are always vigilant and never think they have just gone away. We have to defeat their hatred.”
In a statement to the Mirror, he added: "I got called this word in the 80s, it's now 2023 and I hoped, perhaps naively, that we would have moved on and my kids who were also born here wouldn't have to grow up with some people thinking it alright to say it."
Greater Manchester Police confirmed a report about an incident on April 28 had been filed.
* Follow Mirror Celebs on Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter and Facebook
Do you have a story to sell? Get in touch with us at webcelebs@trinitymirror.com or call us direct 0207 29 33033
