The alleged sexual harassment case at Panjab University involving University Business School Chairperson and dean faculty is now caught in a quagmire of questions where answers are lurking in limbo after the committee submitted its report which failed to prove the allegations. The accused has been given clean chit to the accused faculty members, but the complainant is irked by the report.
A committee is constituted, a report is submitted but the complainant still doesn’t have the clarification of rules under which the committee was constituted. An uneducated rickshaw puller is asked to sign papers which he fails to understand, his refusal to sign leads to clean chit of the accused but the police are still clueless about investigation.
On one hand the complainant Neha Gulati has declared that she will move to the court for justice and on the other hand the police are acting as a sitting ducks citing that they are still to receive the CCTV footages and the findings of the committee, in a nutshell they are clueless.
All the members of the committee after finalising and signing the report had given it to dean, university instructions, (DUI) Madhu Raka, who will further submit it to the V-C's office. The allegation of sexual harassment was levelled by an assistant professor at UBS against department chairperson AK Vashisht and dean, faculty, Dinesh Gupta.
The complainant had alleged that she was sexually harassed and threatened by two senior faculty members outside UBS department in the evening of April 11. The sole witness of the complainant is a rickshaw puller who claims to be present during the incident. The witness gave an affidavit supporting the accusation made by the complainant.
However, the committee says that he refused to give it in written. Neha Gulati refused this claim and said, “That man has been threatened and on top of that he is uneducated and is unable to read so how can he sign what he cannot understandIJ”
She further added that, “At first place the formation of the committee in itself has flouted all the rules of its constitution. For the past one month I have been running from pillar to post to contact the VC and get a copy of the rules under which such committees are to be formed but what I have got is neglect and disregard so I have decided to move to the court for justice.”
The statements by UBS faculty members in support of the accused and with the eyewitness not signing the statements led the committee to submit the report that they could not substantiate the allegations.
Now, it is the V-C's office, which would take a final call on the matter, since the report had been submitted there. However the police department is still waiting for the committees report and CCTV footage to carry on further investigation which clearly indicates the laxity of the officials in the matter.