Sexual harassment: Students protest against lecturer; College defends accused

Mangalore, Jul 22: A group of students of St Raymond's College, Vamanjoor, on the outskirts of the city on Tuesday boycotted the classes and staged a protest against their Kannada lecturer Harish Acharya after one of the II PUC students accused him sexually harassing her. Several parents also took part in the protest.

Meanwhile, the management of the college has warned the students and defended the accused lecturer, whose misbehavior allegedly forced one of the female students to attempt suicide on Monday.

When the girl was rescued by her parents she revealed the horrible face of her Kannada lecturer, who allegedly used to send lewd messages and sexually harass her in the college.

According to the victim, she was made to stand in Harish's chamber when he misbehaved with her. He had been asking her to “adjust with him” for getting more marks and accused of threatening to give her fewer marks in the examinations if she refused his overtures.

Sources from Mangalore Rural Police Station, said that police launched a manhunt to nab Harish, who went absconding after he was booked under sections 354, 509, 116 read with 306 of the Indian Penal Code. Since the victim is a minor, police also slapped sections 11, 12, and 16 of the POCSO Act.

Principal of the college Sr Cecilia D'Souza, defending the accused said that Harish Acharya was working as a Kannada lecturer in the same college for more than a decade and not a single complaint was received against him so far.

Accusing the victim of taking revenge against a “strict” and “honest” lecturer, she said that the girl in question had committed several blunders in the past and her classmates too had complaint against her. However, she failed to reveal how the girl had troubled her classmates.

The principle went on to claim that if the girl was facing sexual harassment from anyone she could have brought to the notice of the college management.

“We came to know about such allegation only through the police. This is a baseless allegation,” she said, adding that the college would set up a probe the charges levelled against the lecturer.

Meanwhile, another group of students demonstrated in support of the accused lecturer and shouted slogans against the girl. They said that the girl was trying to tarnish the image of the lecturer through false allegations against him.