IWPC hosts open house discussion on rising sexual harassment incidents

In the wake of the #MeToo movement, the Indian Women's Press Corps held an open house discussion Friday on the increasing instances of sexual harassment of women and the threat of defamation suits faced by complainants.

T K Rajalakshmi, senior journalist and president of the Indian Women's Press Corps (IWPC), said a report and final decisions taken at the discussion will be forwarded to the Group of Ministers (GoM) that was constituted last month by the government to strengthen the legal and institutional frameworks to deal with and prevent sexual harassment at workplaces.

The queries at the discussion were addressed by Supreme Court advocate Kirti Singh.

Some of the takeaways of the discussion were strengthening of the POSH (The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act and doing away of criminal defamation.

The discussion also stressed the need for employers to blacklist employees regularly found guilty of sexual harassment and any time a woman makes a complaint it should be taken up.

Allegations of sexual harassment against prominent people in various fields have come to light under India's online "#MeToo" movement, which started with actor Tanushree Dutta accusing fellow actor -- Nana Patekar -- of harassing her during the shooting of a Bollywood film in 2008.

M J Akbar, former Minister of State for External Affairs, film-makers Subhash Ghai, Sajid Khan, Rajat Kapoor and actor Alok Nath are among those who have been accused of sexual misconduct. They have denied the allegations.