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R K Pachauri, accused of sexual harassment by an employee and possibly facing more cases of a similar nature, proceeded on leave from the charge of director-general of The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri) and resigned as chairperson of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on Tuesday.
Pachauri’s resignation from the IPCC came as the complainant recorded her statement before a magistrate for a second day.
The complainant, a research assistant at Teri, had alleged continued sexual harassment by Pachauri over two years, despite repeatedly demanding a stop to it. She had filed a complaint with Teri on February 9 and then with the local police on February 13. On February 18, the city police registered a formal First Information Report or FIR in the case, after it was reported by The Economic Times. Since then, a second complainant gave a testimony through her lawyer, Vrinda Grover, claiming she and others, too, had been similarly harassed and that there was a clear pattern to this at the non-government body. She has not yet filed a formal complaint with the Delhi Police.
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In the wake of such developments, focus has also shifted to Teri’s observance of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace Act, 2013, in handling the case through its internal complaints committee. Under the law, the internal committee of an organisation is required to provide a copy of the complaint to the accused within seven working days of it being filed. The accused — in this case, Pachauri — was required to give a reply within 10 days of receiving the complaint. Till date, Pachauri has not done so, confirmed Meeta K Mehra, a Jawaharlal Nehru University professor and external member on the internal committee of Teri.
Mehra told Business Standard the 10 days from the time Pachauri got a copy from the committee had not expired. Teri’s reply said so, too: “The complaint has been forwarded to the respondent as stipulated and the respondent still has sufficient time to provide his response.”
Law & reality
However, Mehra’s own appointment on the internal committee of Teri to deal with issues and incidents of sexual harassment has come under scrutiny. She has no previous experience or association with gender issues or sexual harassment, she admitted. “I have not had the chance so far to deal with these issues but it is an inappropriate time for me to talk about it right now. You should speak to Teri,” she told Business Standard. She is not on her own university’s Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment, she confirmed. And, the regulations are strict in requiring that the external member on the committee not only be a woman but from “non-governmental organisations or associations committed to the cause of women or familiar with the issues relating to sexual harassment”.
Additionally, she has a close association with Teri and its affiliate bodies. Her biodata on the university website states she is also a “Member of the board of studies of the Faculty of Policy and Planning, Teri University, New Delhi, India” and has been a guest faculty at Teri University for several years. She has also served with Pachauri on the editorial board of Teri’s journal as associate editor. Her areas of interest are, “international trade, environmental management economics, political economics of regulation and environmental-economic modelling”.
Teri defended her appointment, stating: “We have taken due care in appointing the members of the Internal Complaints Committee and have followed the requirements.”
The lawyer for the complainant, Prashant Mendiratta, said since it was made, his client had been approached once on February 18 by Teri authorities, claiming the external member of the sexual harassment committee wanted to meet her at the Teri guest house. The complainant did not do so, as she’d already filed a complaint before the police and was proceeding with the giving of her statement before the magistrate. Mehra was unwilling to take any other questions on the matter than the two she had answered before.
Ahead
Grover said, “If the committee has not been constituted as per law, the employer, in this case the Teri administration and Pachauri, would be in violation of the statute and liable for a fine up to Rs 50,000.”
Two female employees at Teri that Business Standard spoke to off the record said no efforts had been made to sensitise other employees at the work place even after the incident had come to the fore. Responding to why it was not deemed necessary to do so, Teri said, its ‘Policy on sexual harassment’ was announced on its internal mailing list and “is available in its compendium of rules and regulations on TERI Intranet.”
Section 19 of the law requires that the employer display, at any conspicuous place in the workplace, the penal consequences of sexual harassment and the orders constituting the internal complaints committee. It also requires the employer to organise workshops and awareness programmes at regular intervals for sensitising employees with the provisions of the law. It is also required to assist the complainant, upon her request, to file a case before the police.
In the wake of such developments, focus has also shifted to Teri’s observance of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace Act, 2013, in handling the case through its internal complaints committee. Under the law, the internal committee of an organisation is required to provide a copy of the complaint to the accused within seven working days of it being filed. The accused — in this case, Pachauri — was required to give a reply within 10 days of receiving the complaint. Till date, Pachauri has not done so, confirmed Meeta K Mehra, a Jawaharlal Nehru University professor and external member on the internal committee of Teri.
Mehra told Business Standard the 10 days from the time Pachauri got a copy from the committee had not expired. Teri’s reply said so, too: “The complaint has been forwarded to the respondent as stipulated and the respondent still has sufficient time to provide his response.”
Law & reality
However, Mehra’s own appointment on the internal committee of Teri to deal with issues and incidents of sexual harassment has come under scrutiny. She has no previous experience or association with gender issues or sexual harassment, she admitted. “I have not had the chance so far to deal with these issues but it is an inappropriate time for me to talk about it right now. You should speak to Teri,” she told Business Standard. She is not on her own university’s Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment, she confirmed. And, the regulations are strict in requiring that the external member on the committee not only be a woman but from “non-governmental organisations or associations committed to the cause of women or familiar with the issues relating to sexual harassment”.
Additionally, she has a close association with Teri and its affiliate bodies. Her biodata on the university website states she is also a “Member of the board of studies of the Faculty of Policy and Planning, Teri University, New Delhi, India” and has been a guest faculty at Teri University for several years. She has also served with Pachauri on the editorial board of Teri’s journal as associate editor. Her areas of interest are, “international trade, environmental management economics, political economics of regulation and environmental-economic modelling”.
Teri defended her appointment, stating: “We have taken due care in appointing the members of the Internal Complaints Committee and have followed the requirements.”
The lawyer for the complainant, Prashant Mendiratta, said since it was made, his client had been approached once on February 18 by Teri authorities, claiming the external member of the sexual harassment committee wanted to meet her at the Teri guest house. The complainant did not do so, as she’d already filed a complaint before the police and was proceeding with the giving of her statement before the magistrate. Mehra was unwilling to take any other questions on the matter than the two she had answered before.
Ahead
Grover said, “If the committee has not been constituted as per law, the employer, in this case the Teri administration and Pachauri, would be in violation of the statute and liable for a fine up to Rs 50,000.”
Two female employees at Teri that Business Standard spoke to off the record said no efforts had been made to sensitise other employees at the work place even after the incident had come to the fore. Responding to why it was not deemed necessary to do so, Teri said, its ‘Policy on sexual harassment’ was announced on its internal mailing list and “is available in its compendium of rules and regulations on TERI Intranet.”
Section 19 of the law requires that the employer display, at any conspicuous place in the workplace, the penal consequences of sexual harassment and the orders constituting the internal complaints committee. It also requires the employer to organise workshops and awareness programmes at regular intervals for sensitising employees with the provisions of the law. It is also required to assist the complainant, upon her request, to file a case before the police.
