Sexual harassment infringes on the following two fundamental rights provided by the Constitution of India: One is the right of a woman to gender equality under Article 14 and the other is the woman's right to life and live with dignity under Article 21. Supreme Court provided clear guidelines for dealing with sexual harassment in 1997. These guidelines which are legally binding and must be enforced include definition of sexual harassment at the workplace, prevention of such harassment, disciplinary action against the erring employee, and employer's responsibility in ensuring a harassment-free workplace.

As per the Supreme Court guidelines, Directorate of Shipping Services (DSS) has constituted an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) for managing gender issues at workplace . ICC was set up not only to deal with complaints of sexual harassment of women in the workplace but also to focus on creating awareness and educating about gender issues.

The objectives of the Internal Complaint Committee to Prevent Sexual Harassment of Women at the Workplace are as follows:

• To ensure the implementation of the policy in letter and spirit through proper reporting of the complaints and their follow-up procedures.

• To uphold the commitment of the Institute to provide an environment free of gender based discrimination.

• To promote a social and psychological environment to raise awareness on sexual harassment in its various forms.

• To create a secure physical and social environment to deter any act of sexual harassment.

• To evolve a permanent mechanism for the prevention and redressal of sexual harassment cases and other acts of gender-based violence at the Institute.

• The aggrieved party may make, in writing, a complaint of sexual harassment to the ICC, within a period of three months from the date of incident and in case of a series of incidents, within a period of three months from the date of last incident. The complaint should include:

  

• The Committee may, before initiating an inquiry, at the request of the aggrieved party, take steps to settle the matter between her and the respondent through conciliation. No monetary settlement shall be made as the basis of conciliation.

• Where a settlement is arrived at, no further inquiry shall be conducted by the ICC.

• After concluding its investigation, the Committee shall submit a detailed reasoned report to the DSS.

• When the Committee arrives at the conclusion that the allegation against the respondent is malicious or the aggrieved women or any other person making the complaint has made the complaint knowing it to be false or the aggrieved women or any other person making the complaint has produced any forged or misleading document, it may recommend to the Institute to take action against such falsification.

• Nothing precludes the Committee from taking cognizance of any new fact or evidence which may arise or be brought before it during the pendency of the inquiry proceedings or even after the communication of the findings to appropriate authorities.

• The complaint regarding Sexual Harassment can also be made by sending e-mail to dss@and.nic.in or to the email address of the Presiding Officer of the Internal Complaints Committee - rajani.varma@and.nic.in.

The Sexual Harassment electronic Box (SHe-Box) is an effort of Govt. of India to provide a single window access to every woman, irrespective of her work status, whether working in organised or unorganised, private or public sector, to facilitate the registration of complaint related to sexual harassment. Any woman facing sexual harassment at workplace can register their complaint through this portal. Once a complaint is submitted to the 'SHe-Box', it will be directly sent to the concerned authority having jurisdiction to take action into the matter.

SHe-Box - Online Complaint Management System