People's Democracy
(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)
No. 46
November 17, 2013
|
Vol. XXXVII
No. 46 November 17, 2013 |
The
girl students subsequently filed a
complaint, and the Kallapett police filed an FIR against
the aggressor under
IPC sections 506 and 509. But the students who supported
the girl students in
filing the complaint came under constant threat, and on
the morning of October 1,
2013, a gang of hooligans including Jithu manhandled them.
They threatened that
they would cut off the legs of those students who stood
with the girl students
if Jithu and other assailants are suspended from the
university because of the
complaint filed by the girl students. The gang also
brutally beat up one of the
students; his tooth was broken and he had to be admitted
in JIPMER, However,
the security personnel of the university
remained mute spectators throughout even as the gang
unleashed violence. When
one of the girl complainants
approached the vice chancellor with her grievance, she was
discouraged from
filing a complaint --- the VC’s prime “concern” was that
the “reputation” of
the institution would get spoiled. But, the SFI said, such
insensitivity of the
university authorities has been one of the prime causes
for the continuance of
instances of sexual harassment in the campus. Following
the recent incidents, the said students
are under constant fear of being attacked at any moment.
Ever since one of the
girls filed a complaint, she has been continuously
subjected to intimidation
and threatened that she wouldn’t be allowed to complete
her course of study in
the university. Even more shockingly, the attempts to
intimidate her were being
led by Mr Praveen, a faculty member of the Department of
Physical Education.
There are also attempts to divert attention from the
matter by fabricating
false cases against the students who helped the girls in
filing the complaint
against the attacker. IRRATIONAL
AND SHOCKING
ACTION On
October 1 night, students of the university
conducted a protest action against the aforesaid criminal
acts in the campus,
and the action saw massive participation of girl students
and others. The
students demanded that the university must take steps on
an urgent basis to
stop ragging, sexual harassment and goonda raj in the
campus, and that the university
must set up a Gender Sensitisation Committee against
Sexual Harassment (GSCASH)
in order to address complaints of sexual harassment in the
university. However
in a decision that is patently illogical,
irrational and shocking, the PU administration issued a
memorandum, signed by
the university’s registrar, suspending the two girl
students (Kavya M and Vidya
T Appukuttan) and five other students (N C Monu, P V
Abhijith, B Abhijith, Rony
Paulose and K Jyotish) who stood by the girls. In its
order dated November 1, 2013,
the university administration sought to equate the
aggressors and the victims
by portraying the acts of sexual harassment and ragging as
a case of “mutual
fight and exchange of abusive words.” The other charges
were even more
ridiculous. Approaching “the media to release the news
without obtaining due
permission from the university” and organising
“unauthorised protests within
the university campus” were the other “crimes” the
victimised students had supposedly
engaged in. These charges and the decision based on them,
needless to say, were
totally unjust, as any democratic-minded citizen of our
country would tell.
After all, the right to protest against injustice
constitutes the very essence
of democracy. The right to freedom of speech and
expression as well as the
right to assemble peaceably and without arms is part of
the fundamental rights
guaranteed by the constitution of In
view of these incontrovertible facts,
the SFI memorandum urged the minister of human resource
development to urgently
intervene in order to ensure that the 1)
The university must immediately revoke
the suspension order served on the said seven students ---
the complainants and
those who stood by them. 2)
The university must to ensure the safety
and security of girl students in the campus. 3)
The university must to punish the
culprits in the case in an exemplary manner. 4)
The university must set up a GSCASH
immediately as the students have been demanding. The
SFI memorandum stressed the disturbing fact that 16 years after
the Supreme Court, in its Vishaka judgement of 1997, laid
down binding
directives regarding the formation of committees to deal
with cases of sexual
harassment, and yet, in spite of the recently passed law
against sexual
harassment in workplaces, a GSCASH has not been formed
even in most of the
central universities, what to speak of colleges. The SFI
has also demanded that
steps must be taken to ensure punishment to those who
indulge in ragging in
campuses, that GSCASH must be constituted in all the
universities and colleges
in On
behalf of the SFI, its president, Dr V Sivadasan, and others met the
HRD minister. AIDWA
CONDEMNS VICTIMISATION Through
a statement issued from The
AIDWA has expressed the opinion that
these actions of the university authorities are totally
against the law which
does not allow any kind of victimisation of those who make
a complaint of
sexual harassment. The statement said the students who
should have been
suspended are those who are responsible for the
harassment. Thus, instead of
getting justice, the girl students have been penalised for
demanding justice. Apart
from putting forward the
abovementioned demands, the AIDWA has also demanded that a
proper inquiry
should be conducted against the miscreants who are
responsible for the
harassment and for creating a hostile environment in the
university. It has
reiterated the right of all students to protest against
violation of their
dignity and against sexual harassment and ragging. The
association said that,
apart from protesting against this violation of law and
justice in Authorities
Victimise
Sexual Harassment Victims
THROUGH a memorandum submitted to M Mangapati
Pallam Raju, the minister for human resource development
in the government of
BACKGROUND
OF
THE
INCIDENT
The
background to the recent developments is
as follows. Kavya M and Vidya T Appukkuttan, who are
first year students of MA
in Mass Communication and MA in English respectively,
were ragged by Sreejith,
a senior student of the Department of Physical Education
on September 21, 2013.
Nay more, Sreejith, alias Jithu, verbally abused the
girls and, moreover,
threatened to rape them when the girls told him that
this was not the way he
should talk to them. He threatened that he would assault
the girls physically
at any cost during the nest two years of their course of
study in the university.
He also made vulgar gestures at them. A day after the
incident, this very same
person went to the girls and told them that he would
sexually assault them if
they dared complain about him. Monu, a friend of Kavya
and Vidya, who was with
them when the first incident happened, was threatened by
Sreejith that if the
girls went ahead with the complaint, Sreejith would
stigmatise their image “the
girls who were sexually assaulted by Sreejith.”