There are many cases when even educated and liberal women, quite aware of their rights, fail to report harassment. They choose to do nothing about the molestation and harassment they face at work. Imagine a girl from a small town moving to a metro city to start her career, she enters into a well-known company and just as she starts learning she faces what she cannot even discuss. She can’t report, it’s her first job and that person has been there for years. Even if she gathers the courage to speak up, who’s going to believe her? It’s hard to go to the same place and face the same person who haunts you even at home! For people working in shifts, they get lucky if the shifts are different, but what if they are the same? Anyhow you have to survive.
According to a report by Indiaspend, 70% of working women do not report such cases. Ministry of Women and Child Development, published a data which shows that number of cases of sexual harassment in workplace registered jumped 54% from 371 cases in 2014 to 570 in 2017. 533 cases were reported in the first seven months of 2018. Increase in the number of cases is noticeable, but what should be pointed out is many women choose to keep quiet because they fear the repercussions. I bet there are many cases which are not even noticed because freshers from any industry have to shape their career first, and involvement in these cases would only negatively impact them.
Women suffer from anxiety and depression when such things happen to them. But if women prefer not to complain about it, how do they deal with it? They change their office routine, they speak less and they end relationships. Worst they could do is ‘quit the job’, sometimes even without having another job in sight. Some women opt for mental health counseling as well. Women who wish to be financially independent have to go through a life-changing trauma.
The government has taken steps like introducing ‘Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, after the 2012 Delhi gangrape case. According to this act, sexual harassment includes a) physical contact and advances, b) a demand or request for sexual favours, c) sexually coloured remarks d) showing pornography and e) any other unwelcome physical, verbal or non-verbal conduct of sexual nature.
Well, get it when you hear someone saying, “Don’t tell anyone in office that I call you”. Sounds fishy? Yes, it is. To review such cases, all companies now have an ‘Internal Complaints Committee’ (ICC) to handle situations and take appropriate actions – which according to the laws should have 10 members. Now forming these committees is compulsory under The Companies Act, 2013 to address sexual harassment. But the real question is, do they perform their job well? Because what we see in offices is just some stick-on on some corners of the office which reads ‘say no to harassment’.