Petition in SC seeks CBI probe into 'suicide' of govt PSU employee

The mother of a 33-year-old woman, a BHEL employee who allegedly committed suicide due to sexual harassment at workplace, has filed a writ petition before the Supreme Court seeking a direction to urgently transfer the criminal investigation in the case to the CBI from Telangana state police. The case pertains to unfortunate death of her daughter due to sexual harassment at her workplace at BHEL, Hyderabad.

Hyderabad:The mother of a 33-year-old woman, who committed suicide last year due to alleged sexual harassment at her workplace at BHEL, Hyderabad, has moved to the Supreme Court seeking a direction to urgently transfer criminal investigation in the case to the CBI from Telangana state police citing latter's incapability in conducting the probe.

Alakh Alok Srivastava, lawyer for the mother, in his petition, stated that the petitioner's daughter was a bright, young and intelligent finance professional, having other qualifications. She had joined BHEL in 2009, at a young age of 23 years and served BHEL till her last breath i.e. till October 17, 2019, with utmost dedication and devotion to her duties.

There was not even an iota of complaint against her work or against her mental behaviour during her long association with BHEL, Srivasatava in his petition claimed.

She was sexually harassed, molested, stalked, mentally tortured and attempted to be raped by her own supervisor and by her own office colleagues at BHEL, Hyderabad, which forced her to ultimately commit suicide on October 17, 2019, at a young age of merely 33, the petition claimed. The petitioner, herein, being an aggrieved mother, is seeking justice for her daughter.

Apart from urging the apex court to give directions to BHEL to conduct an appropriate inquiry against the accused in a time-bound manner, the mother claimed that the influential positions of the accused had hindered the investigation, and the officers are forced to give culprits' a clean chit.

The suicide note of the deceased and her last telephonic conversation with her sister, categorically established that her own supervisor and office colleagues subjected her to extreme level of sexual, physical and mental harassment and attempted to rape her, due to which she was forced to commit suicide, the petition claimed.

"Mummy, I have lost. I lived very strongly till now but today they have crossed all the limits. They have made my living difficult. If I continue in office in the future too then either they will rape me or they will molest me. Sorry for leaving you this way," read the suicide note.

The mother accused Telangana police of being "strong linguistic and regional bias" as the culprits are local people while the deceased's family belongs to Madhya Pradesh.

"Despite repeated requests of the family members of the deceased, the investigating authorities only provided a blurred, Whatsapp copy of the post mortem report of the deceased, that too on 25.11.2019 i.e after elapse of about 40 days from the death of the deceased," read the petition.

The petition claimed that the deceased daughter of the petitioner categorically stated that attempt to rape and repeated sexual harassment by the main accused, Arther Kishore Kumar, and other co-accused persons, had prompted her to commit suicide.

However, despite this, the state police have not yet arrested the main accused, or any other accused persons and have not conducted their custodial interrogation.

"This shocking attitude of local police of victim blaming and victim shaming, even before completion of the investigation, has given a firm and reasonable apprehension in the mind of the Petitioner that just and fair investigation of her daughter's death, will not be done by Telangana police and that is why she is praying this Hon'ble Court with folded hands to transfer the instant investigation to CBI," read the petition.

To their surprise, on the contrary, police had, illegally given clean chit to the accused persons, in their latest report of June 2, 2020, filed before the National Commission of Women (NCW), the petition claimed and sought a CBI enquiry into the entire case to unravel the truth.