Gwalior :The former Additional District and Sessions Judge in Gwalior, who has filed a sexual harassment complaint against Madhya Pradesh High Court Judge S K Gangele, has claimed that three other judges also abetted the alleged harassment by interfering with her day-to-day sitting in the court.

In her eight-page complaint, which has been sent to Chief Justice of India R M Lodha and some other Supreme Court judges, the alleged victim has claimed that her harassment increased after the two judges were transferred to Gwalior District Court in April 2014, and Gangele used them to torment her. The third judge in question was a district registrar.

The complainant has alleged that “on the instructions” of Gangele, these two judges started inspecting her courts “with an unusual frequency — regularly, hourly, and at times within a span of minutes after starting of the court, even before two minutes of lunch time, one minute after lunch time, five minutes before rising of the court.”

The woman has claimed that the judges could not find any fault with her and in fact, she extended her court timings to clear the backlog. She has alleged that these judges’ intentions became clear when she met one of them with a request for a full-time bungalow and office peon. She claimed that the judge told her he could not help her, and she should see Gangele if she wanted anything.

“Thus, it became apparent that the reason for all this unnecessary harassment being inflicted by my own senior on me was to somehow break my resolve, and make me succumb,” said the woman, adding that she still continued to do her work with sincerity and decided not to cave in to Gangele’s “evil demand”.

The judge, meanwhile, said the allegations were false and were levelled against him after the woman judge’s resignation. In a letter to the Chief Justice of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, he claimed she had called him on June 14 when he was on vacation in Delhi and told him that district registrar Naveen Sharma was harassing her. He said that when he returned, she visited him at his residence along with her husband and reiterated her grievance against Sharma.

The High Court judge said that except this particular phone call and the home visit, no calls or text messages were exchanged between the two. “It can be verified from my call details or from any other method as Your Lordship may think proper,” he said in the one-and-a-half page letter.

He said she was transferred to Sidhi on administrative grounds, but he was not aware of the reason. He said that after the transfer, she called him again and requested that it be cancelled, but he told her it was not possible for him because he was not on the committee that decides transfers.

“I do not know under what circumstances and under what influence she has made such type of allegations,” he said and added that if he was found guilty by the probe agency, he would be ready to face the death penalty without trial.

He also told The Indian Express that he would continue to perform his duties and would go on leave immediately if advised by the chief justice.

In her complaint, the alleged victim has claimed that she and her husband met a sitting judge of the HC’s Jabalpur bench, who assured them that he would speak to Gangele.

The complainant, who resigned on July 15 after she was transferred to Sidhi, blamed her transfer on these three judges, claiming that they made a “frivolous, baseless and malicious” reporting to the Chief Justice of the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

After her plea for an extension of eight months was rejected by the Registrar General, she claimed she had no alternative but to go to Gangele since he was in charge of the administration. Gangele, she alleged, told her that she was being transferred “for not fulfilling his aspirations and for not visiting his bungalow alone even once.”

She claimed the Jabalpur bench judge advised her to file another representation for reconsideration of transfer to some other district. She was also advised to seek an appointment with the HC Chief Justice. Her second representation was rejected, and the Chief Justice’s office declined her an appointment, she alleged.

“Only because the perpetrator is so powerful as an administrative judge of a bench, he can cast all evil upon me… I do not even get a hearing. Imagine if a judge, who is herself part of the Vishakha Committee, is not getting justice, how failed this system must be,” she said in her complaint. The woman has demanded appropriate action after fact-finding and a mechanism for redressal of such grievances for subordinate judicial officers.

The Supreme Court registry, in its official response, said, “With regard to allegations of sexual harassment of Additional District and Sessions Judge, Gwalior, a thorough e-mail has been received in the registry which is being dealt with appropriately.”

Meanwhile, a PIL seeking a judicial inquiry against the judge has been filed. The plea demands that Gangele should be suspended till the probe is completed.