Dear Tarun,
I am coming straight to the point. I
have been working in a salaried job for the past three years. I understand how
sexual harassment at workplace affects performance and motivation of an
employee. Sexual harassment does not only mean unwanted physical contact, even sexually
tinted words and lecherous looks can unnerve a man/woman, after all how long
can one ignore them.
I decided to write this letter to you because this instance of harassment happened in an
NGO, where one expects people to be slightly more conscious about women’s
rights and laws. I started my professional life with an NGO in Ranchi,
Jharkhand, which was working in the area of HIV AIDS awareness. I was really
motivated to give my best and I packed my bags and went off to another city
with dreams of changing the society and saving lives.
Our NGO was funded by a government organisation
which sometimes sent evaluation experts. There was this really weird guy who
would sometimes come to our office to check on the progress of projects. He
seemed like a lecher to me and sometimes he would just sit staring at females
in our office. I was new, but I understood that because his evaluation meant a
lot to our fund flow everyone tolerated him and behaved cordially with him. My
female colleagues also advised me that I should put up a smileand greet him
whenever he entered our room. It was the most difficult task that I had to
perform during my tenure there.
Because we worked with HIV AIDS awareness we sometimes
had to visit other organisations which worked with sex workers. On one such visit
this lecher accompanied us to an NGO which had a female project head. After our
visit he told my boss in an audible tone, “Ye
bhi waisi hai, usko pooche kya wo karegi?” ( She is also a sex worker,
should we ask her for sex?) I felt sick,
really sick because of the way it was said and that Look in his eyes which seemed
to strip naked every female he saw. I was disgusted even though the comment was
not directed at me. And this was happening in an NGO and not another IT/BPO
office filled with so-called ‘socially unconscious’ robots.
The problem with working in an HIV AIDS project is
that sexually coloured remarks, which also amount to sexual harassment according
to the Vishakha Guidelines, can be camouflaged if one is clever enough. This
socially conscious man (read pervert/ creep) was quite clever. One day, I told
my boss about the problem and he said that he will try his best to keep that
creep away from me. But I knew that he would do no such thing.
However, I tried to keep the faith in the importance
of my work and worked late hours in office and also on holidays. I love working
hard and hate laziness in office, but because of one perverted male I started
losing my enthusiasm and wanted to quit the job. Fortunately, I got a good
offer to work as a Research Assistant on an impact assessment study being
conducted by one of the top social sciences institutes in the country and I
left Ranchi. I never heard a word from the creep after that except for a few
mails asking me for some non-existent documents and photos. I added his e-mail
to my block list. My regret is that time I could not find proper grounds on
which I could haul him up for sexual harassment.
I am really thankful that the journalist had the
courage to complain against a 'high profile' person like you. I hope that your case has been a wake up call for media houses, NGOs and law firms, which find it easier to write about sexual harassment
and fight such cases , rather than provide a healthy working
environment for their own employees.
With loads of pity for you,
M
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