Kerala HC orders Malayalam film production houses to set up panel to address sexual harassment
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Members of Women in Cinema Collective (WCC) during a press conference in Kochi. File
In a landmark judgement, the Kerala High Court on Thursday directed that Malayalam film production houses have to form an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) as per the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013- commonly known as POSH act.
Each film unit in an industry is an establishment and an ICC needs to be constituted for that purpose, the Court observed.
The bench comprising Chief Justice S Manikumar and Justice Shaji P Chaly observed that AMMA has agreed to set up an internal complaints committee and ordered other film organisations like FEFKA and MACTA should also constitute ICCs.
In the operative part of the judgement read out by the court on Thursday, apart from film organisations, media houses too have been directed to have ICCs in accordance with the POSH Act.
The order by the court came after it heard public interest litigation filed by the Women in Cinema Collective (WCC) for establishment of grievance redressal mechanism in the Association of Malayalam Movie Artists (AMMA), the body of Malayalam movie actors.
The Women in Cinema Collective was formed after the actor assault case in 2017 in which actor Dileep is one of the accused. The WCC had made it clear that they would strive to fight against gender disparity in Malayalam cinema.
As a part of this, the organisation went to court in October 2018 asking for internal committees to be set up in Malayalam movie organisations as per the POSH Act.
The state of Kerala and AMMA had been named as the respondents when the PIL had initially been filed by the WCC.
The Centre for Constitutional Rights Research and Advocacy then joined the petition and widened its ambit, stating that internal committee committee's must be formed also in media houses and political parties.
In a bid to strengthen the plea, the Kerala Women's Commission had also filed an impleading application in the matter.
In a petition at the High Court, the Commission said that the state government must ensure that AMMA sets up an IC in line with the Vishaka guidelines and the POSH Act.
