Unsafe
Campus, Safe Harassers ?
By Subhash Gatade
08 May, 2007
Countercurrents.org
( Delhi University, which
has under its ambit 79 colleges and which caters to more than 7.5 lakh
students, and which has remained in the forefront of many a democratic
demands of the people in general and teaching community in particular,
is today very much in the news albeit for totally wrong reasons. This
short note focuses itself on two recent cases of sexual harassment and
the way the university administration has tried to deal with them.)
Let
us call him Prof X.
A respected faculty in URDU
department, a man of (they say) letters, harasses one of his girl students.
The poor girl which has fought against heavy odds to reach there, finds
her world crumbling down.
A lady teacher in the department
(Let us call her Dr Salma) decides to take up her case. Fights a lonely
battle. Forces the university administration to conduct an enquiry.
But three years on, the enquiry committee has yet to come up with any
conclusion.
The respected faculty, supposed
to be an Urdu Alim is firmly ensconced in his seat.
And the poor girl, with lot
of promise has lost her mental balance.
But can it be said that the matter has ended there with a single tragedy.
Little did anyone realize then that daggers were already out for the
lady teacher for standing upto this ‘respected faculty’.
It has been more that three months that media reported about the campaign
which is being run on the net targeting Dr Salma wherein ‘..Some
unknown persons have compiled a piece of literature, pornographic in
nature, which stars the Urdu lecturer and mailed it to Urdu faculties
and also to Urdu magazines and newspapers.’( (metronow, 7/3/07
Vanita Chitkara, Porn Assault on DU Urdu Teacher)
In an interaction with the reporter Dr Salma has revealed what she says
as the ‘unpleasant reality of Urdu Department of Delhi University’
where ‘there is sexual abuse, there is an apathetic and unresponsive
university body and there is the age old attempt to force a woman into
her place by attacking and maligning her character.’
As of now there has been
no breakthrough in the investigation, despite Dr Salma’s lodging
a formal complaint with the police.
For all practical purposes the ‘respected’ family still
keeps singing paens to Urdu language repeating it umpteen times that
it is a language of tehzeeb (culture) and the poor girl, who is undergoing
psychiatric treatment, is still trying to come to grips with the real
meaning of tehzeeb.
0 0
The case of Prof Vidyut Chakrabarty, the present head of the department
of political science, Delhi University, who also holds the posts of
Dean of Social Sciences and Director, Gandhi Bhavan (an institution
which comes under Delhi University) is more blatant. A section of the
media has already reported that Prof Chakrabarty, faces a serious charge
of sexual harassment. [City pages of Times of India and Hindu (mainly
in the week beginning April 16, 2007, but there are also reports today,
May 1, 2007)]
It is now history how the
dilly-dallying and initial attempts at cover-up on part of the university
authorites forced a lady employee working under him at Gandhi Bhavan,
to rush to the media to explain his depredations.
Once the case made headlines
the university administration had no other option than to appoint a
enquiry committee to look into the case. But it was immediately clear
to even a layperson that the top dons of the university were not very
serious about the investigation itself and were keen to save one of
the senior members of the faculty from any aftermath. And they saw to
it that Prof Chakravarty continues to remain in his positions of power
and continue to influence the outcome of the case. This despite the
fact that Policy on Sexual Harassment (Ordinance XV (D)) passed by the
university itself few years back specifically emphasizes the fact that
the alleged perpetrator - in all such cases of sexual harassment at
the workplace - relinquish all his positions of power or the university
administration (temporarily, pending enquiry) relieves him of all or
suspends him.
It need be added that the
said policy was formulated by the university administration in the backdrop
of the Supreme Court Judgement on cases of Sexual Harassment at workplace
( August 1997, Vishakha and others vs, the State of Rajasthan and others)
and the guidelines issued by it to make all such ‘workplaces’
free of genderbased violence.
One can oneself imagine the
awe inspired by any such head of the department, head of any institution
who wields tremendous influence in making/breaking careers. And one
easily gather the outcome of the case if the alleged perpetrator is
allowed to remain in his post.
Recently this penpusher (or should I say bytepusher) came across an
urgent appeal sent by senior members of the department of political
science itself who have taken upon themselves the onerous task of helping
the valiant woman, in her struggle for dignity and self-respect.
As their letter makes it
clear they met the top bosses of the university administration including
its vice-chancellor and communicated to them it is not only unethical
but illegal that Prof Chakrabarty has still not been asked to step down
or has been suspended so that a thorough investigation is done. But
they discovered to their dismay that rules or even ordinances are meant
for public consumption and not for implementation.
The letter tells us that
once the courageous woman went to media’ Prof Chakrabarty's long
history of habitual sexual harassment and quid-pro-quo relationships
started trickling in. (Much of this had circulated as rumours for years.
One incident that is established (in 1991-2) is of a doctoral student
being assigned another supervisor after she complained to the Dept about
his behaviour. Nothing was done to him.’
Their appeal also gives few
details of the manner in which Professor Chakrabarty ‘habitually
imparts an oppresively sexual colour to the male-female and especially
the teacher-student relationship,’ when he speaks in public and
infers that they ‘are inclined to give credence to the complaint
from the Gandhi Bhavan employee’
0 0
Both the cases demonstrate
a few things very clearly.
- Despite noble intentions
of the Supreme Courts in issuing the guidelines, fact remains that they
are observed in breach and all the talk of making the workplaces free
of sexual violence is still a mirage.
- Looking at the fact that persons in authority ( who normally happens
to be the harassers) can never allow any impartial enquiry into their
own acts of sexual behaviour, one needs to revisit the guidelines themselves
and make third party intervention a must.
- It raises serious questions about the prime institution like Delhi
University itself which has refused to lead by example. Gone are the
days when it raised its voice in unison against voices of insanity and
illiberalism. Gone are the days when it led the teaching community for
better quality of life.
One still remembers the sexual
harassment case filed against one Prof Bhatia who happened to head one
of the departments of Delhi University in mid nineties. There were many
complaints against him but very few women dared raise their voice against
him. Most of them either left the department unannounced or remaining
few continued to suffer in silence. But there was another brave woman
who dared to raise her voice. She exposed Prof Bhatia’s depredations
and the manner in which he was instrumental in ‘spoiling many
a budding careers’.
The case caught imagination
of a wide section of university community. There were protests and rallies
to take action against Prof Bhatia. Despite the high profile campaign
and the support it generated in a section of the media, there was only
some symbolic action against him. The man who ‘spoiled many a
budding careers’, the man who was a habitual harasser was allowed
to retire with ‘dignity’.
You can rightly say that much water has flown down the Jamuna and also
add that now things would be different since we have the policy on sexual
harassment in our kitty.
Can it be then said that
with surety that the case of harassment faced by the student in Urdu
or the way porn assault has been unleashed on Dr Salma or for that matter
the struggle for dignity launched against Prof Chakrabarty would meet
a different fate than one witnessed in case of Bhatias’
Perhaps it would be better
to wait for an answer.
Subhash Gatade can be reached
at [email protected]
Digg
it! And spread the word!
Here is a unique chance to help this article to be read by thousands
of people more. You just Digg it, and it will appear in the home page
of Digg.com and thousands more will read it. Digg is nothing but an
vote, the article with most votes will go to the top of the page. So,
as you read just give a digg and help thousands more to read this article.
Click
here to comment
on this article