Mangalore, May 30: With no progress in the investigation even after constituting an Inquiry committee to look into the sexual harassment case filed by a woman ASI against a senior police officer, Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI), Forum Against Atrocities of Women (FAAW), Dalit Sangharsha Samiti (DSS) and other like-minded organisations, have urged the government to intercede in the matter and speed up the investigation process.
At the joint-press conference held here on Thursday, members of the organisations said that the accused in the case ACP T R Jagannath was mounting pressure on ASI Shrikala to withdraw her complaint. An inquiry committee which has been set-up as per Vishaka guidelines, has not been functioning yet. The accused ACP has not yet been suspended and may influence the investigation, they stressed.
Activist Vidya Dinker of FAAW said that the case was clearly a case of sexual harassment at the workplace. However, the victim of sexual harassment is being pressurised and framed in several complaints in various police stations falling within city limits. Fresh charges have been filed on her family members in a two-year-old fraud case, which was earlier closed following a B report. These are attempts being made to save Jagannath from the implications of the case. It is a conspiracy to keep the complainant mum. This pressurisation of the victim of sexual harassment has to stop, she said.
District president of DYFI Muneer Katipalla said that although complainant Shrikala had applied for anticipatory bail in the fraud case filed against her in Mangalore Rural (Kankanady) police station, it was yet to be granted, posing a problem for her to attend the meetings held by the inquiry committee, he said.
He also alleged that these were attempts by the Commissionerate to close the issue and create a situation wherein police personnel would hesitate to file cases of sexual harassment against senior officers in the department.
Vidya Dinker also said that a fact-finding report on the case would be compiled by the committee within two weeks, in order to articulate the entire episode of the harassment and ordeal faced by the ASI Shrikala. “There are so many twists and turns in this case, that it has to be looked at in a wider perspective. Since the complainant has been unable to articulate all the details in the case, they would be recorded and included in the fact-finding report, in order to bring out the truth in front of people,” she said.
“There is also no statement or comment on this matter by any of our elected representatives in the district, which is sad,” she added.
Senior litterateur Sara Aboobakar, DSS leaders Krishnananda D and Raghu Yekkur, and SFI leaders Jeevan Raj Kuthar, Nithin Kuthar and B K Imthiyaz were present during the conference.
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