The Supreme Court administration has formed a five-member committee to receive complaints of sexual harassment, investigate them and make necessary recommendations.
Justice Krishna Debnath, a High Court division judge of the Supreme Court, has been made chairman of the committee.
The other four members are: Justice Kazi Zinat Hoque, also a High Court division judge, Md Badrul Alam Bhuiyan, Registrar of the Appellate Division, Advocate Fawzia Karim Feroze and Advocate Tamanna Ferdous. The committee has been formed following the High Court verdict delivered in 2009, said a statement issued by Md Ali Akbar, Registrar of the Supreme Court, recently.
Following a writ petition, the HC on May 14, 2009, issued a set of guidelines defining sexual misdemeanours to prevent any kind of physical, mental or sexual harassment of women, girls and children at work and public places and educational institutions in the country.
The HC directed the government to make a law based on the guidelines and ruled that the guidelines must be ‘treated as law’ until the law had been made.
The court directed the authorities to form a female-led five-member harassment complaint committee at every workplace and institution to investigate allegations of women harassment.
The majority of the committee members must be women, it ruled.
According to the guidelines, nobody can touch or hurt the body of a girl or woman with bad intention, any indecent word or comment cannot be used against them, and any unknown adult girl or woman cannot be addressed as ‘beautiful’ with bad intention.
The HC prohibited the authorities concerned to disclose the names and addresses of the complainants and accused people until the allegations are proved.
It also criminalised teasing women and children through e-mail or telephone and ordered that any kind of provocation or character assassination must be stopped.
