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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Harass law to be stricter by Charu Sudan Kasturi

Harass law to be stricter by Charu Sudan Kasturi

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published Published on Feb 21, 2010   modified Modified on Feb 21, 2010


Institutions will need to protect not just female employees but even women visiting office premises from sexual harassment under new, last-minute changes to India’s proposed law against sex pests at the workplace.

The changes proposed by the women and child development ministry cover victims, not working, where they face sexual harassment from an employee, protecting girls visiting their parents’ offices or women atheletes training at sports camps.

The law ministry has accepted the changes and the Protection of Women from Sexual Harassment at the Workplace Bill, 2010, may be approved by the cabinet soon, top government sources told The Telegraph.

The changes, if approved by the cabinet and Parliament, will extend the application of the Supreme Court’s landmark 1997 Vishakha judgment that ordered the government and employers to protect employees from office harassment.

The bill is principally aimed as the legislative backbone necessary to implement the Supreme Court judgment.

It defines sexual harassment as “unwelcome sexually determined behavior, physical contact, advances, sexually coloured remarks, showing pornography, sexual demand, request for sexual favours” and sexually-coloured conduct “whether verbal, textual, physical, graphic or electronic”.

It also includes any implied or overt promise or threat of preferential or detrimental treatment for a woman employee based on her response to the harassment.

“The argument for the change is simple. A law to make a workplace a safe environment cannot discriminate between victims on whether or not they are employees,” an official closely associated with the bill said.

The draft law, that has been in the pipeline since 2006, has till now defined an “aggrieved woman” as “any woman employee against whom any act of sexual harassment is alleged to have been committed”. But a section of the government was arguing for several months now that the bill must include provisions for justice for women merely visiting the “workplace” where they face harassment.

Their argument was principally based on statistical data from across the world that suggests that dependents of employees are often as vulnerable to sexual harassment as the employees themselves.

The government has also repeatedly received complaints from amateur women atheletes training at sports camps that administrators, selectors or coaches seek sexual favours.

This section found greater support within the government following the recent public furore over the molestation and subsequent suicide of a teenage girl, Ruchika Girhotra.

Girhotra was allegedly molested by senior and feted former Haryana DGP at a tennis club where he was president, and where she played the sport.

An internal inquiry conducted by the state police had found the officer, S.P.S. Rathore, guilty, but no action was taken against him.

The changes to the proposed sexual harassment law would have covered such instances as Rathore was an administrator.

The tennis club would have had to conduct an independent inquiry with representatives from civil society groups and would mandatorily have to act on the probe team’s recommendations — over and above any police investigations.

The government is also finalising a separate bill to set up special fast track courts to complete trials in cases of sexual offences within six months. That bill however only tackles physical offences.


The Telegraph, 22 February, 2010, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100222/jsp/frontpage/story_12135633.jsp
 

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