Hon’ble Mrs. Sangeeta Chandra, J.—Heard Mr S.D. Singh, learned Senior Advocate assisted by Mr Rohan Gupta, learned counsel for the appellant-Institute and the learned counsel for the respondent represented by Shri G.K. Singh, Senior Advocate.

2. This appeal has been filed by the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur Nagar challenging the judgment and order dated 21st of December, 2016 passed by the Hon’ble Single Judge in Writ C No. 30472 of 2016 (Rishabh Jha v. Union of India and others), wherein even while affirming the finding of the Inquiry Committee and the recommendation made by the Inquiry Committee contained in paragraph 33 (b) to (f), the Hon’ble Single Judge has set aside the decision taken by the appellant-Institute dated 30th of March, 2016 notified vide letter dated 7th of April, 2016 and also the order passed in appeal dated 23rd of May, 2016 communicated to Respondent No. 1 vide letter dated 27th of May, 2016 terminating the respondent’s academic programme and also debarring him from entering campus and prohibiting him further to have any contact with the complainant.

3. The Hob’ble Single Judge has limited the punishment to the respondent-petitioners submitting a written apology to the Institute and directed the Institute to declare the result and give the degree to him as he had already given the final year examination in terms of interim order granted by this Court.

4. The facts as mentioned in the writ petition and the counter-affidavit filed on behalf of the appellant-Institute and as have became evident from from the arguments made by the learned counsel for the parties are that the Respondent No. 1 was final year student in the department of Physics and had been admitted in four year programme in July, 2012. On 27.11.2015, a brief letter was received by the Women’s Cell of the appellant-Institute by one girl student (herein after referred to as the ‘complainant’), in which she made allegation of sexual harassment at the hands of respondent No. 1. Accordingly, the Chairperson of the Women’s Cell sent a letter dated 27th of November, 2015 asking respondent No. 1 to appear before the Women’s Cell on 28th of November, 2015 to prima facie satisfy itself whether there was any need or any cause to proceed with a formal inquiry.

5. The respondent No. 1 appeared before the Women’s Cell and answered certain questions on the basis of which Women’s Cell submitted its recommendation that a formal inquiry was needed in the matter and Internal Complaint Committee (herein-after referred to as the ‘ICC’) was constituted to inquire into the matter. A detailed complaint was filed by the complainant on 5.1.2016 and in this complaint, various charges of verbal, emotional and sexual abuse were levelled against respondent No. 1 citing instances from February, 2014 onwards till September, 2015. Accordingly, on 6.1.2016 respondent No. 1 was called and given a copy of the complaint and his response was sought. The respondent No. 1 filed a detailed reply to the complaint on 14.1.2016 alongwith list of witnesses and various documents comprising ‘whatsapp’ messages and E-mail etc. to allege that the complainant had willingly accepted respondent No. 1 as her mentor and he had helped her being her senior and they was never in any sexual relationship, consensual or otherwise between him and the complainant and the entire complaint had been filed in a mala fide manner.

6. After the reply of the respondent No. 1 was analyzed by the ICC, he was asked to appear alongwith his defence witnesses on 2.2.2016 and statements were recorded. The complainant’s statement as well as statement of prosecution witnesses were not recorded in the presence of respondent No. 1 and he was not given opportunity to cross-examine. A report was submitted by the ICC on 18.2.2016, which was subsequently placed before Senate Students Affairs Committee (herein-after referred to as the ‘SSAC’) on 30th March, 2016, which after considering the said report discu