Anna University Sexual Assault Case: The Madras High Court on Saturday directed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) probe into the sexual assault case of a 19-year-old engineering student on the Anna University campus in Chennai. Meanwhile, the National Commission for Women (NCW) also constituted a committee to probe the sexual harassment of a 19-year-old girl inside the Anna University campus in Chennai.
A bench of Justices SM Subramaniam and V Lakshminarayana ordered interim compensation of Rs 25 lakh to be paid to the victim for serious lapse on the part of the police in disclosing her details in the First Information Report (FIR) made available to the public on the Tamil Nadu Police website. Also ordered. Along with this, the court has directed Tamil Nadu Police to provide security to the second year student and her family.
Madras High Court has ordered the formation of SIT, highlighting various flaws in the ongoing investigation of the case. The SIT will include three IPS level officers. The court has strongly reprimanded the police for blaming the victim in the FIR. During the hearing, the bench asked Advocate General PS Raman, have you read the FIR? This is an example of blaming the victim. The court said that it is unfortunate that the victim had to be embarrassed due to the leaking of the FIR. Expressing serious objection to the manner of writing the FIR, the Court emphasized the duty of the state and society to protect women.
The High Court further asked why a woman could not walk alone freely, or wear clothes of her own choice, or talk to a man without criticism. A woman should rise above social stigma. It was never his fault, it was only society that judged him. Let us inform that in the FIR, the complainant said that the accused recorded the private moments of the victim with her boyfriend on his phone and came in front of her in the campus and threatened to leak the video and send it to her father and people of the college.
Let us tell you that the victim was sitting with her male friend in the university campus last Monday (23 December). Meanwhile, a man named Gnanasekaran first beat up the victim’s friend, then dragged him behind a building and then assaulted him. Based on the complaint of the victim, the police registered a case and arrested the accused. At the same time, there is a lot of anger among the students regarding this matter.
