A young girl finds a picture of hers uploaded (without her permission) on Facebook, with lewd comments written below it; a soon-to-be-married young man is made to feel uncomfortable by another man’s unwanted attention. Things take an ugly turn when the former starts receiving anonymous emails that threaten to expose his supposed flirtatious escapades with other women; a man is forced to endure a woman’s advances because she holds the key to his future.

These horrifying, emotionally scarring instances are real-life experiences faced by people in their workplaces. At a recent TiECON event held in Chennai, nine people released books on various topics. Viji Hari, one of the authors, chose an important subject to write on — sexual harassment at the workplace. The book, called BCC — Behind Closed Cubicles , narrates real instances of sexual harassment faced by both men and women.

“I specialise in the topic of sexual harassment and, for the last three-and-a-half years, I’ve been interacting with clientele across India (on various topics),” says Viji, CEO and Co-founder of Kelp HR, an HR marketplace platform. “I meet a lot of people and conduct several workshops. In the process, I hear of various instances. I have not disclosed the actual names, but have presented the crux of the story.”

Survey shows…

According to a survey done by Kelp HR, of the 291 people who were interviewed, 22 per cent admitted to being harassed in the workplace. “This number should be higher because some people didn’t want to take the anonymous survey — such is the taboo!” she says. Of the 22 per cent, 5 per cent are men, and 3 per cent faced same-sex harassment. “We also saw that of the 22 per cent who admitted to being harassed, only 55 per cent reported the incident. Others either resigned, or stayed mum, hoping the nightmare would disappear.”

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