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On Monday, the Supreme Court refused to urgently hear a petition filed by a lawyer seeking registration of FIRs based on allegations of sexual misconduct and assault levelled by women across various sectors during the #MeToo movement. A Bench, comprising of Chief Justice RanjanGogoi and Justice SK Kaul said that the petition will come up for hearing in the regular course.
Advocate Manohar Lal Sharma approached the court and demanded a direction for taking suo motu action and steps to get records statement of the victim ladies (disclosing their pain upon Metoo twitter platform) as information within the provision of S. 154 of Cr.P.C. to initiate register Criminal cases/F.I.R. under section 354/375/376 and other of IPC and to prosecute accused persons in accordance of law in the interest of justice (sic).
He further seeks constitution of fast track trial courts for conducting the trial in such cases in a time bound manner, in addition to a direction to the National Commission For Women (NCW) to create a safe platform for women to file complaints while protecting their identity.
Furthermore, it demands that the NCW be directed to treat the “Metoo platform” as a practical source of first information on instances of sexual harassment, to initiate criminal proceedings against the accused. The #MeToo movement has taken the country has taken the country by storm, with the list of alleged perpetrators increasing by the minute. The movement in India began with actor Tanushree Dutta accusing veteran actor Nana Patekar of harassing her during the shooting of a film in 2008. Since then, scores of women have come forward with sexual harassment allegations against actors, musicians, journalists, stand-up comedians and politicians.
Allegations have also been made against Consulting Editor of The Wire, Vinod Dua, by film maker Nishtha Jain. On October 14, in a Facebook post, Jain had named Dua, accusing him of demeaning her and cracking lewd jokes during a job interview, and stalking her. In response, The Wire has constituted an external committee headed by former Supreme Court judge, Justice AftabAlam to probe the allegations. The committee also comprises of former Patna High Court judge Justice Anjana Prakash, retired Institute of Economic Growth professor Patricia Uberoi, and former foreign secretary Ambassador Sujatha Singh. A one-person secretariat has also been established to assist the committee and to serve as the point of communication for both Ms. Jain and Mr. Dua.
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