The issue has shown up the failure of the State to protect its women who struggle to eke out a living outside of their homes in dignity and safety.
The of Food Safety and Drug Administration (FSDA), like most government departments, does not have an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC), or a local complaints committee (LCC) to receive complaints of harassment as mandated by the Sexual Harassment at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition, and Redressal) Act, 2013.
The Act states that the employer will have to be penalised.
Who’s going to penalise the State, when its own departments do not have complaints committee as mandated by the Act, asks U.Vasuki of AIDWA. “Where is the complaints Committee for the victim to file a complaint?”
The Sexual Harassment at Workplace Act, 2013 that draws from the Vishaka Judgment of the Supreme Court clearly defines harassment at work place as “Unwelcome” acts both “direct and implied” and includes physical, verbal, non-verbal.
The perpetrator cannot feign ‘intention’ as an excuse, since it is for the woman, who is at the receiving end, to perceive an act as ‘unwelcome’, offensive, and sexual and not for a third party to judge the intention of the act or the victim’s perception of the act, says Ms.Vasuki.
For the women at the receiving end, it is dual battle - one against departmental ignorance, and another against the police that view the complaints through a male prism.
The Act clearly states that a circular should be prominently displayed in workplaces to pin employer responsibility. The police appear to be unaware of the wording and spirit of the Act, if one were to go by the alleged line of questioning of the complainants. According to Rekha, one of the complainants,
“The police asked us, why we didn’t quit and if we were touched, to file a complaint.”
This should also highlight the status of the complaints committees within the police department, says Ms.Vasuki.
“An RTI by the TN government employees association had shown that 15-16 district police departments had internal complaints committee. But, now it forces us to examine, if these are “functioning’ complaints committees, with an informed third party in the committee, to look at complaints of sexual harassment of women in uniform,” says Ms. Vasuki.
