The Calcutta High Court recently asserted that calling a woman ‘sweety’ or ‘baby’ was not always tantamount to sexual harassment. The observations were made while Justice Sabyasachi Bhattacharyya heard a former Coast Guard trainee's case against her superior.
The HC also cited relevant sections of the Prevention of Sexual Harassment committee to underscore its point.
“The use of the expressions 'baby and sweety' has been held by the Internal Complaints Committee itself to be inappropriate. However, it is to be noted that once the petitioner informed the alleged offender about her discomfort in that regard by WhatsApp and otherwise, he never repeated the terms of endearment to address the petitioner. Such expressions may be prevalent in certain social circles and need not always be sexually coloured," the court observed.
The senior officer however insisted that he had not used the terms of endearment in a sexually coloured manner. Moreover, he claimed to have stopped using such words once the complainant expressed her discomfort. The case had previously been dismissed on all counts after investigation by the Internal Complaints Committee — a verdict that was echoed in the Calcutta HC judgement.
The HC also noted that misusing the provisions of the POSH Act could create more glass ceilings for women.
“Since the Statute itself provides sufficient protection (quite rightly so, in view of the harassments often faced by women at their workplaces), a double layer of protection, if extended by adjudicating forums to the complainant, might be counterproductive, since excessive abuse of the provisions of the statute will create more glass ceilings than they remove, creating fetters in the employment of genuinely competent and hard-working female persons," Justice Bhattacharya added.
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