The National Commission for Women (NCW) has taken cognizance of the the plight of Josephine Jeyashanthi, a survivor of sexual harassment at Loyola College, Chennai who is fighting a lone battle against an extremely powerful clergy establishment of the institution hell bent on protecting a bunch of sexual predators.
Rekha Sharma, the Chairperson of NCW had responded to a request made by Nupur Sharma, the Editor-in-Chief of OpIndia through Twitter.
Noted https://t.co/oto9kvMwr7
— Rekha Sharma (@sharmarekha) June 21, 2021
The Commune had first brought to light the issue on 11th October 2020. Josephine Jeyashanthi was sexually harassed and abused by one Dr. S. Antony Rajarajan, who was the head of the Tamil department. He had made sexually charged remarks and even made advances on her. She had lodged a sexual harassment complaint against Antony Rajarajan with the internal complaints committee in December 2012 but was intimidated by the college management for filing the complaint. The Loyola management tried to stall the enquiry against Rajarajan by not allowing the committee to proceed. Albert Williams, the Secretary of Loyola College had asked her to withdraw the complaint. After her persistent efforts, the anti-sexual harassment committee conducted the enquiry on March 19, 2013. The committee submitted its report to the management on March 23, 2013 but has till date not provided its copy Josephine as mandated by statutes.
Josephine also had to put up with further harassment from other authorities like Father Xavier Alphonse, the former Director of Loyola Alumni Association and the main accused in the Mary Rajasekharan case.
After inaction from college management, Josephine had had lodged a complaint with the police against Rajarajan. Immediately after this, on 28th February 2014, Josephine was terminated from her service without prior notice and no valid reason. When she confronted the college management asking for the reason of her termination, the Secretary of Loyola College Albert Williams told her that this was a ‘Christian minority institution’ and that they don’t need to give anybody any reason.
On the other hand, Antony Rajarajan who has been accused of sexual harassment was not only protected by the Loyola College management but was also given privileges like superannuation with salary while the victim was further victimised and terminated from the job.
On 25th October 2019, the Madras High Court gave an order in favour of Josephine allowing her to initiate further action against the culprits in accordance with the law. An interim order was given on 16th June 2020 that directed the Loyola College management to not give any employee/retirement benefits for Antony Rajarajan and also to provide compensation to the Josephine within 60 days. But this has not been done. Josephine has now pinned her hopes on the judiciary to get justice.
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