#YouTooAshoka

1. Have you taken the survivor's (complainant’s) consent to write this open letter?

 

On June 25th 2018, the Vice Chancellor sent a mail to the alumni and faculty expressing that the proceedings with respect to this case were over, that a decision had been arrived at, and that the decision had been communicated to both the parties.

 

However, as you can see from the timeline, the survivor has not been told what the "internal action" taken by the administration is, even after multiple emails from the survivor. The administration seems to be either expressing different things to different stakeholders or equivocating to not talk about the steps it has taken in an honest, transparent, and accountable manner.

 

We decided to write this open letter based on a discussion with the survivor on June 25th and her consent in order to demand transparency, accountability and seek justice.

 

2. Why are you not engaging with the administration of Ashoka University instead?

 

As you can see from the "Alumni-Admin Conversations" tab, we have tried to engage and urge the administration to take stringent action as per the service rules of the University, CASH Committee Reports, and the Disciplinary Committee report. In addition to that the Student Government of Ashoka University had also raised specific questions regarding due process in general.

 

The administration has continuously expressed to us that they are bound by confidentiality rules and that they cannot say anything. While we do respect confidentiality, we fail to understand why the due process has taken such a long time, with multiple depositions causing stress and trauma to the survivor. More importantly, the survivor was prevented from accessing materials related to the inquiry obscuring the due process (you can see this in the email conversations between the survivor and the administration). This has effectively turned the provision of confidentiality, created to protect survivors, into a tool to be used against them.

 

Our internal engagement has not led to anything more than hollow reassurances and rhetoric as one can see from the way this case has been handled. The various reports of Ashoka’s CASH and Disciplinary Committee find Mitul Baruah guilty of misconduct, express that allegations could involve a criminal offence, and that sexual harassment should be treated as misconduct. The CASH of the other university, whose report Ashoka’s CASH doesn’t seem to have considered, had unequivocally observed that there was abuse of patriarchal power and manipulative consent on the part of Baruah. However, Ashoka University insists that Baruah’s actions do not constitute sexual harassment at the workplace without any explanation, an assertion that seems to contradict the report from the other university.

 

This open letter is still a critical engagement with the University. An engagement with the University need not just be behind closed doors or unwritten. While that may seem sufficient in a variety of different instances, we believe in public critical engagement when necessary, which involves bringing to surface the workings of institutions (Ashoka’s CASH in this case) which will, hopefully, strengthen them. More often than not, dissenting voices are accused of lacking in civility in order to prevent pertinent questions from being raised and emotions from being expressed.

 

3. Why don’t you trust the administration of Ashoka University with respect to handling of this case?

 

While we do trust the administration of Ashoka University, we should not stop ourselves from looking at due processes with a critical eye. All our institutions are enmeshed in social structures and are limited by patriarchal, casteist, capitalist biases that marginalise and oppress the already marginalised and the oppressed. Institutions and its functionings replicate these biases because of a variety of reasons, which is why raising critical questions is all the more required.

 

The petition and the mails that we had written to the administration raised important questions. This open letter and the timelines provided, raise many more pertinent questions on the institution’s functioning and its communication to the survivor. The survivor has, in fact, trusted the due process here for quite a long period, spending her mental, emotional and physical energy for over a year, and this has led to no justice. The email conversations between the survivor and the administration indicate that there has been a selective disclosure of facts, misdirection and false assurances. This has enabled the shielding of a faculty member who has been found guilty of professional misconduct and an abuse of patriarchal power in the workplace as stated in the CASH report of the other university.

 

Trust does not mean either complicity or silence, where questions are never asked. Trust involves honesty about how things have fared, how institutions have worked, how a due process may have affected the complainant and a willingness to acknowledge and rectify mistakes. We are putting our trust in these institutions by urging the University to acknowledge its mistakes, correct them, take action, and be reflective and empathetic.

 

4. Won’t this open letter deter complainants from approaching CASH of Ashoka University in the future?

 

We believe that this open letter clearly brings to surface the workings of the due process in Ashoka University as it has worked in this particular case.

 

The process followed in this case includes delays, multiple depositions, and false assurances from the administration. In many instances during this case, Ashoka’s actions have actually been in contravention of its own CASH policy.

 

We believe that bringing to surface the faults in the due process will actually strengthen the CASH of Ashoka University. We hope it will help shape a CASH that upholds the high values of social justice and integrity; an empathetic and sensitive CASH that tries to ensure not only that the complainants are informed about the proceedings at regular intervals, but that their mental health and well-being are also taken into account at every step of the proceedings.

 

We hope that the University reflects on how it has handled this case and works upon building trust so that future complainants aren’t deterred from approaching CASH.

 

5. What are some of the questions that the handling of this case against Baruah raises regarding due process?

 

Many of the points listed below are also mentioned in the open letter; they are compiled here for easy reference.

 

1. According to Section 13 of Ashoka’s CASH policy, CASH has to designate five persons amongst its members to screen complaints. This 5 person screening committee has to carefully study the complaint and determine if a formal inquiry by CASH has to be instituted.
   
   However, in this case, we fail to understand why an ad-hoc committee was constituted involving one member who is not, in fact, part of CASH and why a screening committee was not constituted as per Ashoka’s CASH policy.
   
   If in fact this is the screening committee, then this committee’s role is to essentially understand if a formal inquiry is to be made by CASH or not. In this case, the ad-hoc committee submits a report, based on the depositions by the parties concerned to the CASH and without asking the complainant for any evidence, after which there is no formal inquiry committee instituted by the CASH as per Section 16 of Ashoka’s CASH policy. Instead, an unsigned final CASH report is sent to the survivor.
   
   Why did CASH deviate from its written policy? If there were any pressing circumstances, the CASH needs to clarify those in its final report.
    

2. Section 20 (e) of Ashoka CASH policy expresses that the CASH should make copies of the findings available to both parties to enable them to make representations against the findings before CASH. Section 20 (f) states how both the parties will be given a period of 2 days for making their representations. The survivor was not given the opportunity to make representations against the findings of CASH as per these sections. This was raised by the survivor in her mail on December 22, 2017 to the CASH committee member.
   
   In the same mail (December 22), the survivor also expressed how she wasn’t given the transcriptions of the deposition of November (2017) and wasn’t asked for a list of witnesses. These points had already been raised by her in a mail on December 4th.
   
   While the CASH report expresses that the survivor furnished evidence after the ad-hoc committee enquiry was over, the survivor brings to notice in the same mail (December 22nd) the fact that the ad-hoc committee never asked her for evidence before her deposition in November (2017). She expresses that the evidence furnished by her to the CASH member, who had asked her through a personal email address, was only on the member’s personal request on December 11th (2017), and that she would have handed over the evidence earlier and to the ad-hoc committee if she had been requested.
   
   These are only some instances of how the CASH policy was not followed as it should have been. The CASH needs to explain why such blatant infringements of the written policy have occurred and have not been corrected despite being flagged by the survivor during the process.
    

3. While both the CASH of Ashoka University and the Disciplinary Committee formed by the Board of Management use the ad-hoc committee report to come to conclusions and findings, we do not understand why this crucial ad-hoc committee report has not been provided to the survivor at any point.
    

4. While the Disciplinary Committee report is signed on January 23rd 2018 by the members of the Disciplinary Committee, this report was handed over to the survivor only on April 18, 2018.
   
   Meanwhile, the Executive Authority of Ashoka University provided false assurances and hope to the survivor stating that the Board of Management is convening on March 28th 2018 to come to a final view based on all the reports, and that they needed time to seek legal advice. This is despite the fact that the survivor had sent multiple emails asking why the process is taking such a long time causing stress and trauma to her and how she was assured that a decision would be taken at the earliest.
   
   The University needs to explain the delay in making the Disciplinary Committee report available to the survivor.
    

5. On April 18, 2018, the survivor was called to Ashoka University to collect the Disciplinary Committee report. The survivor had explicitly mentioned before coming to Ashoka University that she should not come in contact with the defendant, Mitul Baruah. Despite her insistence, the administration did not ensure one of the basic mandates of the CASH policy which says that the administration should take steps to prevent the defendant and the survivor from coming in contact with each other. In fact, this was the first time the survivor came in contact with Baruah since her complaint on April 6, 2017 at the other university. This experience has been severely traumatising and triggering for the survivor.
    

6. The Disciplinary Committee report finds Baruah guilty of misconduct according to all ethical norms of professional conduct and conduct at the workplace. But it continues to agree with the ad-hoc committee report that the actions of the defendant would not fall under the ambit of sexual harassment at workplace.
   
   The ad-hoc committee, CASH, and Disciplinary Committee overlook the fact that the CASH report of the other university talks about how the interactions between the survivor and Baruah were largely structured around the premises of the workplace (especially the defendant’s office) and the commutes to and from the workplace. They overlook the fact that the CASH report of the other university concludes that there was abuse of patriarchal power in the professional sphere centered around the workplace, and that there was manipulative consent involved.
   
   The CASH of Ashoka University and the Disciplinary Committee must seriously consider why there is a gross contradiction between the verdicts of their reports and the CASH report of the other university. There should be a clear policy on how reports from other universities are handled by any internal committee of Ashoka.
    

7. The Disciplinary Committee also doesn’t pay heed to the fact that the CASH of Ashoka University expressed that the employer, i.e. Ashoka University, is obliged to treat sexual harassment as misconduct and that the allegations could involve a criminal offence.
   
   The Disciplinary Committee report does not touch upon the sexual harassment and trauma that were raised in the previous CASH reports; this report focuses only on “professional misconduct”. The report doesn’t provide an explanation as to what it means by the term “professional misconduct”.
   
   In addition to that, the report doesn’t provide any recommendations on the action that needs to be taken as per the CASH policy and the service rules of the University. It seems ironic that a body named ‘Disciplinary Committee’, which presumably exists to recommend or implement disciplinary action, instead simultaneously says Baruah is both guilty (of professional and ethical misconduct) and not-guilty of Sexual Harassment at the Workplace.
   
   The Disciplinary Committee report, thus never really provides transparent conclusions and findings that can be understood, questioned, and appealed. We find here that the term misconduct is being used without providing an explanation or context and thus has been used to shield the defendant.
   
   We urge the Disciplinary Committee to clarify what the report means by the term ‘misconduct’.
    

8. After multiple mails and multiple depositions, amounting to more than 4500 words by the survivor and more than 400 days since her first complaint, the Disciplinary Committee member writes to the survivor expressing that they are not bound to disclose to the survivor what internal action was/will be taken since Baruah has not been found guilty of sexual harassment at the workplace.
   
   Whether or not the law explicitly states it, since various committees have found Baruah guilty of misconduct, the survivor should be told what action was/will be taken in accordance with the principles of natural justice. It is disappointing to see that the administration is stating that there has been no sexual harassment and that this doesn’t fall under the ambit of sexual harassment at workplace after almost a year long process with multiple depositions and reports that talk about criminal offense, abuse of patriarchal power and manipulative consent.
   
   The survivor clearly has been treated unfairly in this entire process. It’s disheartening to see the number of mails the survivor has had to write during the last year to the administration, continuously having to ask for updates. In one instance, a mail from the administration expresses how this process has been excruciating for them too. The survivor had to explain how the two “traumas” cannot be put on an equal plane. By continuously instilling hope that there will be an action soon and by providing false assurances to the survivor, and then disengaging with the due process in the end, the administration has also caused severe distress and trauma to the survivor.
    

9. While the complaint was filed in another university on April 6th 2017, based on the enquiry conducted by the CASH body of the other university, the enquiry was again transferred to Ashoka University in September 2017.
   
   We do not understand why the complaint in its initial stage wasn’t transferred to Ashoka University for a detailed enquiry since Baruah was working at Ashoka in April 2017, instead of conducting an inquiry at the other university first. Another option would have been for the CASH body of the other university, based on its enquiry, to come up with recommendations, which it could have asked Ashoka University to enforce. Instead, it recommends a detailed enquiry, which then leads to another round of enquiry through the CASH of Ashoka University.

 

6. Did the survivor put Mitul Baruah’s name on the List of Sexual Harassers in Academia (LoSHA) crowd-sourced by Raya Sarkar?

 

No, the survivor did not put Mitul Baruah’s name on the list. In fact, the timeline of events and the mails written by the survivor throughout this due process show how the survivor did put her trust in the administration of Ashoka University to provide justice, despite the delays and trauma.The survivor filed a complaint with the other university on April 6th 2017, while LoSHA was published online in the month of October 2017.

 

7. Why hasn't the survivor approached the police and filed a complaint? Why doesn’t the survivor approach the courts?

 

The survivor, as you can see from the timeline, did file an FIR against threatening calls and attempts of her email being hacked. Mitul Baruah was listed as the prime suspect based on this FIR.

 

With respect to the justice she is seeking in this case, the survivor has been clear from the start that she is seeking justice through academic institutions.

 

That said, one does have to take into consideration the trauma, stress, and anxiety that a complainant who has faced sexual harassment has to go through, every time they go through a process which involves re-living their memories while seeking justice. Our institutions and spaces wherein we seek justice right now are not safe, empathetic, sensitive, and conducive enough for survivors of sexual harassment to raise complaints and go through the entire due process. One should be careful and empathetic before urging survivors of sexual harassment to trust due processes, file appeals and seek other forms of justice, since the process of seeking justice is ridden with traumatising experiences. The survivor will, of course, make a decision based on their physical, mental, and emotional energies, and we should respect that.

 

8. What are the demands of this open letter?

 

Ashoka University should:

• Take strict and punitive action against Mitul Baruah.

• Acknowledge the faults of due process and provide clarity on the inquiry conducted.

• Apologise to the survivor.

• Provide reparations to the survivor.

• Provide mental health support and incorporate the same into the CASH policy. i.e counselling with a counselor of the survivors choice.

• Make sure future complaints are dealt with in a timely manner, i.e. following existing CASH Guidelines to complete investigations within 90 days and ensure action is taken with 30 days after.

• Ensure that Ashoka will be more transparent, accountable, and trustworthy in the future, by re-examining the flaws in existing procedures.

 

Look at the Open Letter to Ashoka University for a more detailed explanation of our demands.

 

9. How did you come up with the idea of the website?

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We took inspiration from www.youtoopetitions.com. We wanted to ensure that we put in all the information that is necessary to study how due processes in cases of sexual harassment work. We used Canva for snapshot timelines, Prezi for the detailed timeline, and Wix for creating the website. It took about three weeks to ensure that everything was in place. We would be happy to provide guidance on this to anyone who is interested.

 

Mail us at youtooashoka@protonmail.com