Delhi HC rejects former DU teacher’s plea against dismissal over sexual harassment charges.

Source – hindustantimes.com

“Consent, given under coercion, or without volition, is not consent at all”, the Delhi High Court said on Monday while dismissing former Delhi University professor Ajay Tiwari’s appeal against the varsity’s decision to give him compulsory retirement after he was proven guilty for sexually harassing an MPhil student in 2008.

“Consent may become a defence, where it is free. This is for the obvious reason that a victim of an assault, or an act of oppression, may consent to the doing thereof, owing to circumstances beyond the victim’s control, which may partake of coercion. Consent, given under coercion, or without volition, is no consent at all,” Justice C Hari Shankar said in a 58-page judgment.

Tiwari had challenged the DU Executive Council’s decision in July 2011, giving him compulsory retirement from service on the basis of the proceedings emanating out of the complaint filed by the female student.

Appearing for Tiwari, his counsel Manish Kumar Bishnoi said his client was a victim of a conspiracy hatched by the complainant along with other people who had vested interests and whose demands were not met by Tiwari.

The court dismissed the appeal and said, “Consent may be either expressed or implied. Conscious failure to put up resistance, to an act which is being committed, may indicate consent.” It said that the word “welcome” or equally “unwelcome” denotes a state of mind.

Reacting to Monday’s judgment, advocate Bishnoi said he would study the decision and would take a call on appeal after consulting his client.

The single-judge bench said the relationship between a student and teacher is “sacred” and partakes “divinity”.

“So sacred, therefore, is the student-teacher relationship that the slightest sexual tinge therein indelibly tarnishes the relationship and consigns it to profligacy,” the court said, adding there can never be any question of a teacher seeking to justify having committed acts, admittedly of a sexual colour and connotation, towards a student, seeking to urge, in his defence, that the acts were not unwelcome.

The judge said it was “preposterous” and “bordering on absurdity” to take such a defence that there were welcome activities from the student.

“This is essentially because sexually coloured conduct or behaviour, towards a student, by a teacher, is completely proscribed, morally as well as legally. Any such conduct, therefore, if committed or exhibited, can never be defended on the ground that the conduct was not unwelcome to the student.

“It is not, therefore, in the opinion of the court, open to a teacher accused of sexually coloured remarks, or exhibiting other conduct having sexual connotations, to urge, in his defence, that the student welcomed the acts,” the court said.