Experts Emphasize On Timely Relief To Victims Of Sexual Harrasment At Workplace

By Santu Das

New Delhi: Experts on Saturday hailed the government's initiative, like the SHe-Box portal, which serves as a unified platform for women across the country to file complaints of sexual harassment at the workplace, and emphasised on timely relief for such victims.

They asserted that justice is crucial, but speedy justice holds even greater significance.

The statement of the experts comes in the wake of recent data provided in the Parliament over the total number of complaints lodged in the newly launched SHe-Box portal (August 2024) and the number of cases disposed of.

According to the data provided by the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development, the total number of complaints received so far in the portal is 265. Out of these, 85 complaints have been disposed of.

To ensure the prompt resolution of complaints, the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development said it has instituted various measures. These measures encompass the display of freeze messages on the dashboard and the dispatch of regular reminders to nodal officers and Internal Committee Presiding officers/Local Committee chairpersons through emails and mobile text messages.

In order to optimize the process of submitting and monitoring sexual harassment complaints on the portal, as well as to improve the portal's user-friendliness and enhance the overall experience for users nationwide, a multilingual support feature has been implemented, it said.

Furthermore, complainants are able to monitor the status of their complaints in real-time, receiving updates regarding the progress and any actions undertaken. This level of transparency is instrumental in ensuring accountability and facilitating swift resolutions, as per the Ministry.

Laws To Ensure Women's Safety In The Workplace

The government has enacted 'The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013', which aims to safeguard women from sexual harassment in the workplace and to facilitate the prevention and resolution of related complaints. This Act applies to all women, regardless of their age, employment status, or the nature of their work, whether they are employed in the public or private sector, or in organised or unorganised sectors.

The Act imposes a duty on employers across all workplaces, both public and private, to ensure a safe and secure working environment that is free from sexual harassment. Consequently, every employer is required to establish an Internal Committee (IC) if the number of employees or workers is more than 10. In addition, the above appropriate Government is empowered to form a Local Committee (LC) in each district to handle complaints from organisations with fewer than ten workers or in cases where the complaint is directed against the employer himself.

The time prescribed for inquiry under the Act is 90 days.

How To File A Complaint On The SHE-Box Portal?

A complaint can be submitted on the portal by an aggrieved woman or by another individual acting on her behalf. If the aggrieved woman is the one filing the complaint, she must log into the portal by providing her basic information, including her work status, name, phone number, and email address. Conversely, if the complaint is being filed by another person, that individual must log into the portal by registering their name, their relationship to the complainant, and an undertaking from the complainant, in addition to the work status, name, phone number, and email of the aggrieved woman or complainant.

Based on her employment status, the individual filing the complaint is required to select the IC or LC of the workplace where the complaint is to be lodged. If the IC or LC of the aggrieved woman is already registered on the portal, the complaint will be automatically submitted and directed to the relevant IC or LC.

However, if the IC of her workplace is not registered on the portal, the system allows for an online procedure to gather information about that workplace from the complainant and notify the State Nodal Officer and District Nodal Officer of the respective State or Union Territory and district to facilitate the prompt registration of that IC.

Victim's Voice

A woman, who had alleged her colleagues of body shaming and hurling objectionable remarks at her, while speaking to ETV Bharat, on the condition of anonymity, emphasized the need for sensitisation of employees and ensuring confidentiality of the complaint.

Narrating her ordeal, she said, "After I had filed the complaint through official channels to the concerned committee designated for this purpose, a member of that panel had made it public, sharing the same information in one of our office groups. This was disastrous. Because of that revelation, the day I went to the office, everybody looked at me in a different way. This had given me an additional trauma. I filed a complaint against him, but no action was taken against the said member. So, there is a need for sensitisation."

Asked about the status of her complaint, she said, "Although I fought and provided the required evidence. But, in the middle, I felt as if I was alone in this fight, and my health conditions were deteriorating. While fearing that I might be sacked, I decided to seek for settlement. Though I was not happy with this decision, I had to because of my job."

She said there is a need for more awareness in this regard.

Experts Views

Speaking to ETV Bharat over the matter, Advocate Vivek Garg said, 'The Act and Effort of the government is good and helpful for victims, but it needs to be strengthened more for speedy justice."

He said justice is essential, but speedy justice is more important.

Referring to the recent data of the SHe-Box portal in Parliament, another expert, Dr Santosh Kumar told ETV Bharat, "While the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 clearly mandates time-bound disposal of cases, the data reveals that SHe-Box functions primarily as a facilitative and tracking platform, not as a statutory adjudicatory authority."

"Complaints are forwarded to Internal Committees or Local Committees, where the actual responsibility of disposal lies. This structural decentralisation often results in uneven capacity, delays, and procedural bottlenecks at the implementation level," Dr Kumar, who is also an Assistant Professor at a private university, said.

He asserted that transparency alone cannot guarantee justice unless the institutions tasked with redressal are adequately trained, monitored, and held accountable, adding that the data suggests that while reporting mechanisms have improved, redressal capacity has not expanded at the same pace.

"The effectiveness of the law must be judged not by the existence of portals or reminders, but by timely relief to complainants. For SHe-Box to be truly transformative, stronger oversight of Internal and Local Committees, periodic public reporting, and clearer accountability mechanisms are essential. Otherwise, digital governance risks becoming symbolic-visible in form, but limited in substantive impact," Dr Kumar added.