Hyderabad: A former junior court assistant of the Supreme Court has accused Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi of sexually harassing her.
She alleged she was asked asked to wish him in the morning and message him on reaching home. “I felt it was a bit strange. Second thing that was strange was Justice Gogoi had called me into his office room, he told me that I was one of his assets”
She claimed in her affidavit: “On one occasion I was wearing an orange kurta and dupatta. The CJI referring to my clothes, told me, ‘You are looking pretty good today’.”
The CJI asked me to come and stand next to him, he got up from his chair. The CJI then asked me, ‘What can you do for me?’. I kept repeating that I was very grateful (as he helped my disabled brother-in-law get a job). The CJI then slid his hand from the back of my head, along my back to my hipline, till my lower back. I immediately froze and my body stiffened. I think the CJI sensed this, and so he pulled both my cheeks, like one would do to a child. He told me that he is like this with his daughter too.”
She stated that it was at this moment that she felt she was sexually harassed. “CJI again asked me what I could do for him. When I again said I was very grateful, he said, ‘No, No, I know you will not speak, so write it down and show it to me’. I was stunned and shocked as I immediately realised that the CJI had touched me in an extremely inappropriate manner. I did not know how to respond. I told myself, “bade log, maybe this is normal behaviour.” I suppressed my discomfort because I was stunned and shocked that man of his stature could do something like this.”
Then, on October 11, 2018: “He took my hands into his and told me that my hands smell nice, he then pinched my cheeks, he then put his arms around my waist from the front, he said, ‘I want this from you’. He hugged me around the waist, and touched me all over my body with his arms and by pressing his body against mine, and did not let go. He told me ‘hold me’, he did not let go of me despite the fact that I froze and tried to get out of his embrace by stiffening and moving my body away. Since he did not stop forcibly hugging me, I was forced to push him away from me with my hands, she alleged. He then told her not to tell anyone else.
