Sexual harassment case against National Green Tribunal chairman Swatanter Kumar
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notice on a law graduate’s plea to put in place a permanent mechanism to attend to the complaints of sexual harassment by both sitting and former judges at all levels of judiciary, including the apex court.
The notice, returnable by February 14, has been issued to the centre, the secretary general of the Supreme Court, Justice (Retd.) Swatanter Kumar, and Attorney General GE Vahanvati.
An apex court bench headed by Chief Justice P Sathasivam, while issuing the notice, made it clear that “at this moment we are not expressing any opinion on averments or allegations by the law graduate”.
In view of the importance of the issue to evolve a permanent mechanism to address the complaints of sexual harassments by the judges at all level, the court said it appointed eminent counsel Fali Nariman and KK Venugopal as amicus curiae to assist the Supreme Court.
The court order came on a petition of a former law intern who alleged sexual harassment by then Supreme Court judge Swatanter Kumar.
At the outset of the hearing, Chief Justice Sathasivam asked: “What is the date of alleged incident?” When told that it relates to May 28, 2011, he asked why did she take so long to report the matter.
The then law intern had written to Chief Justice Sathasivam complaining about the alleged sexual harassment, the court said while noting that the intern had informed her parents and professors about the incident but did not inform the court.
“Being a law graduate”, why did she wait for so long, Chief Justice Sathasivam asked.
At this senior counsel Harish Salve said there is no permanent mechanism to attend to complaints of sexual harassment against judges and the existing grievance redressal committee was “inappropriate” to entertain complaints against judges. (IANS)