From:

To:
Date: 10/27/2018 5:38:32 AM
Subject: RE: Mishandling of Sexual Harassment Complaints at Symbiosis Law School, Hyderabad

Sir/ Madam,

In a recent incident, a female student was allegedly blackmailed by few of her male classmates
(her ex boyfriend and his friends) who threatened to leak her personal photographs. When the
complainant approached administration, the complaint was dealt by Disciplinary committee.
According to the complainant, she was not informed of the actions taken by the committee
against accused. She came to know about the fifteen days suspension of accused through fellow
students. According to the complainant and other students we spoke to, the suspended students
attended a sports fest in another college and were even given attendance for their participation
during the course of the suspension period. After the period of suspension, the complainant was
again targeted by few of the accused. They allegedly passed obscene and sexually coloured
remarks at her. She approached the administration once again on whose instruction she filed a
complaint to Disciplinary committee. She says that she has been made fun of, humiliated by the
accused when she was walking out of Disciplinary committee meetings. At this point, a group of
female students including ourselves approached the Director M.I Baig and Asso. Professor
Prageetha Raju demanding safe environment for the complainant. We raised the issue that the
acts of the accused amounts to sexual harassment and the matter has to be dealt by Internal
Complaint Committee. However, Prof. Raju was quick to point out that it is not a case of sexual
harassment and it was simply personal grudge between the two parties which escalated into
something else. When M.I Baig was questioned about, “why the matter was not transferred to
ICC, when they realized it was sexual harassment?” He replied stating that the onus was on
complainant to come before ICC and not on the college to transfer it to ICC. In the later stages,
upon being informed about ICC, complainant requested student affairs committee to transfer her
case to ICC but she was told that disciplinary committee shall deal with the case, if results
weren’t satisfactory then the case shall be passed on to ICC.

In another case, complainant had filed a molestation case against her classmate. She said that
she wasn’t taken seriously by the Deputy Director Dr. Sukhwinder Singh Dari who asked her to
reach a compromise with the accused as he had apologised to her. According to the
complainant, he even told her that it is our duty towards god to forgive those who are repentant.
When she persisted on going forward with the matter, the Dy.Director allegedly threw away her
written complaint and told nothing is going to come out of this. Later, when the complainant
approached Symbiosis International University head office in Pune, action was taken against the
accused. When we asked Associate Professor Prageetha Raju about the matter, she told us that
“he was simply trying to put an arm around her and she was uncomfortable with it”, while the
allegations were about groping from behind. The complainant, in a personal conversation
mentioned that she thought Prof. Prageetha Raju was biased towards the accused. Nevertheless,
Prof. Raju was a part of the committee that took action against the accused though she told us
that she was asked ‘not to speak’ during the proceedings by the Director. She also said that the
accused was given an option to leave the college without any mention of the complaint against
him in the transfer certificate or to serve the suspension of six months and come back to college.
When the accused was contacted, he declined to speak about it as he was instructed by the
authorities to keep the matter confidential. Former Associate Professor Banerji Chakka told us
that he was called to the Director’s office and asked to sign the report of the fact finding
committee in the case. He declined from signing the report as he was not a part of the committee
and wasn’t a witness to the proceedings. This happened right before the NAAC team visited the
college for accreditation.

In another incident, a group of female students complained against Asst. Professor Srinivas
Methuku of constant ogling and causing discomfort, Director M.I Baig allegedly passed a
remark that his eyes are like that which is not his problem. At this point, no written complaint
was taken against the accused and no procedures were followed. The accused had allegedly
humiliated a female student by questioning her about her relationship with a boy in the campus
and nothing was done about it.

In another incident, Female students raised complaint against former campus administrator Patil
in open house for passing sexually colored remarks and shaming women for not clothing
themselves properly. Though he was replaced, he was a committee member in a recent
Disciplinary committee proceedings with regard to Anti-Ragging complaints received. He has
been once reinstated again.

In the first Case, the proceedings of Disciplinary committee hearing is over and the verdict is yet
to come out. The complainant hopes for a satisfactory resolution. In the second case, the
complainant is unwilling to talk to us about the issue as more than a year has passed since the
incident.
Also in the first two cases, the complainants have informed the authorities at head office, Pune
about the hostility of administration towards them at Symbiosis and no action has been taken so
far.

But we have a few concerns about the way matters at hand are being dealt in Symbiosis Law
School, Hyderabad.

1. The institution barely acknowledges the complaints of sexual harassment, intimidates female
students to back out and tactically procrastinates the proceedings to deter the complainant.

2. The complainant has to always take the matter to Symbiosis International University which in
turn shall direct Symbiosis Law School, Hyderabad to take action. By this time, authorities at
Hyderabad would turn hostile towards complainant for surpassing them.

3. They don’t voluntarily constitute ICC and upon being asked to, they refuse to acknowledge
that complaints are about sexual harassment.

4. Due Process has never been followed, campus has not been sensitized about sexual
harassment and most of us continue to remain ignorant about what amounts to sexual
harassment and the way to deal with it.

5. We expect the institution to set up a robust mechanism to deal with women grievances and
also direct sexual harassment complaints to ICC and for ICC to follow due procedures and give
a fair verdict.

We are writing this with the hope that you"ll help us do the needful. All the information
mentioned above has been collected from conversations with the complainants, College
Administration and other persons involved. We believe that if a thorough investigation is
conducted, the institutional mismanagement can be proved. We're willing to co-operate with you
anytime.

Thank you,

Snigdha Jayakrishnan, 3rd year BA LLB

Apoorva Y.K, 3rd year BA LLB

Symbiosis Law School, Hyderabad

Symbiosis International (deemed) university