Failure to constitute an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) as required by the Sexual Harassment of Women at Work Place Act, 2013 can lead to penalties for the employer as per Section 26 of the Act.

JUDGMENT

Prathiba M. Singh, J. (Oral)--This hearing has been done through hybrid mode.

2. The present petition has raised a grievance that the Petitioner has been wrongly terminated and her complaints of sexual harassment have also not been dealt with in accordance with law. It is submitted on behalf of the Petitioner that though an Internal Complaints Committee (hereinafter, "ICC") was constituted by Respondent No.4-Company, no proper inquiry has been conducted and there is no progress in the matter.

3. The matter was first heard on 13th November, 2019 and Ms. Shruti Naraynan, Ld. counsel for Respondent Nos.1 to 3, had submitted that a letter dated 5th March, 2018 was written by the Delhi Commission for Women (hereinafter, `DCW') to the Respondent No.4-Saha Infratech Pvt Ltd. By the said letter the DCW had referred the complaint to the Director of the Respondent Company for inquiry by the ICC of the company and also directed the filing of a status report. The said letter read as:

The above named woman has filed a complaint against Mr. Abhishek Chaturvedi posted as Senior Manager-HR in Company. The Commission refers the complaint to you for inquiry by the Internal Committee/Local Complaints committee constituted under section 4/under section 5 of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Work Place (Prevention, Prohibition, and Redressal) Act, 2013.

The status report is also to be submitted to the commission within one month and the final report after completion of the inquiry.

4. In response to the said letter, the company had informed the DCW that they would be constituting an ICC and submitting a final report within 30 days. The said letter reads as:

We have received your letter dated 05/03/2018, requesting us for an inquiry into the sexual harassment Complaint, alleged by Ms. Fauziya Rubbani against Mr. Abhishek Chaturvedi-Senior Manager-HR.

We had requested Ms Fauzia Rubbani, vide email dated to submit her official Complaint to our Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) at icc@sahadevelopers.com, to proceed with inquiry of the matter by our ICC, but have not received any email till date, from her.

Since, the matter has been referred to us, we shall accordingly conduct an inquiry through our ICC and shall submit a status report at the closing of 30 days and the final report after inquiry, in due course.

We have observed extremely unsatisfactory performance by Ms. Fauzia Rubbani, which has resulted in financial losses to our Company and therefore we had requested a satisfactory explanation from her end. It was also discovered, that despite taking repeated leaves, she had with a malicious intent, modified her leave records in the system.

The details, as are available from the records of the Company are enclosed along with this letter, for your kind reference.

However, it is submitted on behalf of the DCW that no final report has been received.

5. It appears that no ICC has been constituted by the Respondent No. 4 and therefore, no final report has been given.

6. Since the Respondent No. 4 has continued to avoid constituting the ICC and is also appearing before the DCW, the present writ petition was filed by the Petitioner seeking the following reliefs:

A. Issue a writ in the nature of direction awarding compensation for non-constitution of Complaints Committee by the Respondent No.4 in terms of Section 26 of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition & Redressal) Act, 2013, which came into force w.e.f. 09-12-2013 holding that the Respondents Nos. 4, 5 & 6 have violated the Fundamental Rights of the Petitioner under Articles, 14, 15, 19 and 21 of the Constitution of India;

B. Issue a writ in the nature of Mandamus/direction holding that the Respondents Nos. 6 with the aid of Respondent no. 4 & 5 have sexually harassed the Petitioner and acted vindictively with premediated malice against the Petitioner and direct the respondent no. 1 to initiate action against Respondent no. 6;

C. Issue a writ in the nature of Mandamus