Public hearing on sexual harassment in workplaces from Nov 9-20

Kolkata, Sep 26: A coalition of women’s rights experts, gender rights activists and rights-based organisations in West Bengal has announced a public hearing on sexual violence in workplaces from November 9-20. The hearings will take place across multiple districts, including Kolkata, and will focus on the experiences of women, trans and queer persons in workplaces.

The announcement was made at a press conference held at the Press Club of Calcutta by a distinguished panel of activists, which included Anuradha Talwar, Jhuma Sen, Daminee Benny Basu, Amrita Dasgupta, Kolika Mitra and Munmun Biswas.

The public hearing initiative comes in the aftermath of the rape and murder incident at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, which has sparked widespread outrage. The hearings will serve as a platform to document cases of workplace sexual harassment, focusing on marginalized gender groups, and provide recommendations to address policy gaps.

Speaking at the press conference, Dasgupta, a women’s rights activist, emphasised the importance of intersectionality in addressing workplace violence. “The incident in RG Kar has brought out unprecedented collective outrage on the streets. 1 in 3 women are victims of sexual violence. The NCRB data, 2022 shows 4,45,000 cases of crime against women in India. But the actual incidents of such crime are way more. Most women and marginalised group do not go to the police to report… We think there needs to be a review and the public hearing has this as one of its aims,” she added.

Sen, a human rights lawyer, expanded on the significance of this initiative. “This public hearing is an effort to understand why gender-based violence persists in workplaces, even after 27 years of the Vishaka Guidelines. Our aim is to examine whether the legal mechanisms in place, such as Internal Committees (ICs) and Local Committees (LCs), are effective in addressing the issue,” she said.

The hearings will be conducted by maintaining strict protocols of confidentiality, and will allow survivors to present their testimonies anonymously as well. The jury will include eminent figures such as former Chief Justice of the Orissa High Court, Justice Murlidhar, noted mental health professional Ratnaboli Ray, feminist activist Anuradha Kapoor etc. Advisors for this initiative include former Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Ruma Pal, former judge of the Madras High Court, Justice Prabha Sridevan, former bureaucrat Anita Agnihotri amongst others.