S. Muralidhar, J.

The background to these two writ petitions by the same Petitioner is more or less the same. The reliefs sought are different. Writ Petition (Civil) No. 367 of 2009 challenges an Office Order dated 17th June 2008, issued by the Lady Hardinge Medical College ('LHMC'), a hospital functioning under the Directorate General of Health Services ('DGHS'), Government of India whereby a committee was constituted to enquire into the complaint of sexual harassment made by the Petitioner against Respondent No. 6 Dr. K.P.S. Malik. The writ petition also challenges the consequential proceedings of the said Committee including the report submitted by it on the Petitioner's complaint.

2. The second petition, Writ Petition (Civil) No. 12708 of 2009, seeks the quashing of an Office Memorandum (OM) dated 25th April 2008 issued by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (hereafter 'the MHFW'), Government of India, Respondent No. 1 in the writ petition, Constituting a committee of external experts (hereafter 'Experts Committee') "with a view to substantiate the allegations and counter-allegations" between Dr. K.P.S. Malik (Respondent No. 3 in the said writ petition) and the Petitioner. A challenge is also laid to the Report of the said Experts Committee.

The Petitioner's case

3. The Petitioner states that she is an MBBS and MS (Eye) from Delhi University with an excellent academic record. She is presently working as an Assistant Professor in Ophthalmology under the MHFW posted at the LHMC. The Petitioner states that she has three distinctions and three subject awards in the MBBS course, 52 international indexed publications and one Indian indexed publication. The Petitioner states that after completing her MBBS and MS, she joined as a Pool Officer under the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research ('CSIR') at the Safdarjung Hospital on 1st January 2001. She had initially been working under Dr. R.S. Nanda, the Head of Unit-II of the Safdarjung Hospital. She states that in November 2001 she was suddenly shifted to Unit -I under Dr. K.P.S. Malik.

4. According to the Petitioner, Dr. Malik knew that the Petitioner's husband was on an outstation job. She alleges that Dr. Malik started devising ways to trap her by calling her repeatedly on one pretext or the other. According to the Petitioner, Dr. Malik used to ask her to assist him in surgeries even where such assistance was usually not required, remain close to her and try to touch her. She states that on account of the vitiating atmosphere at the Safdarjung Hospital she left that institution by taking an exemption plea from the pool job and joined the PGIMS at Rohtak as Lecturer in Ophthalmology on contract basis. She states that her children were very small at that time and started passing through stress due to her absence at home, the travel time from Delhi to Rohtak being very long. Her husband then got transferred permanently to Haldia. She had to return and continue on the post of a Pool Officer at the Safdarjung Hospital.

5. According to the Petitioner after her return to Safdarjung Hospital, Dr. Malik adopted all possible means to harass her by posting her outside Safdarjung Hospital and changing the clinics in which she was previously working. He issued a memorandum dated 26th August 2002 stating that she was using immunosuppressive drugs for treating some ocular condition without the approval of the competent authority/technical committee of the Hospital. The letter included a remark questioning why the Petitioner's full tenure should not be terminated "for such serious lapse" and restricted her work only to pursuing her "approved protocol and no other research." Copies of the memorandum were sent to the Principal and Medical Superintendent, Safdarjung Hospital and the Head, CSIR. The Petitioner states that there was nothing wrong in administering an immunosu