New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the reinstatement of a woman judicial officer from Madhya Pradesh, who had quit following her transfer in 2014 after alleging sexual harassment by a high court judge in the state.
A bench comprising Justices L. Nageswara Rao and B.R. Gavai said the resignation of the woman judicial officer “cannot be held to be voluntary”. While the top court clarified that she will not be entitled to her wages for the period she was away from duty, it said that she can continue her remaining period of service. Justice Gavai, while pronouncing the judgment on behalf of the bench, said the decision to accept the resignation of the officer was quashed and set aside.
Earlier, the top court suggested to the Madhya Pradesh High Court to consider reinstating the judicial officer which said that her request cannot be accepted forcing the woman judicial officer to moved the Supreme Court seeking her reinstatement. The petitioner alleged that “hostile” transfer orders were passed in her case as she “did not act as per the demands of the supervising high court judge”. Following the woman's allegations in 2014, the then Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari had set up a committee comprising Supreme Court Judge Justice R Banumathi, Justice Manjula Chellur and Senior Advocate K K Venugopal to probe the charges levelled by the judicial officer against the HC judge.
However, the panel cleared the judge of the allegations even as it found the judicial officer’s transfer “unjustified” and recommended that she be reinstated in service if she wished to join back. Later, a Full Court of the High Court rejected the judicial officer’s plea for reinstatement following which she approached the SC. In her complaint, she said that she was transferred “to a lower category city and also a Maoist affected area, which violated the transfer policy of the high court”.
She added that her transfer also prevented her from being with her daughter who was then appearing for the board exams, therefore she had to resign.
