AI airhostess case reopens

New Delhi: The National Commission for Women (NCW) has pushed Air India to look into sexual harassment charges against Captain Devi Sharan, the pilot who shot into the limelight for flying the hijacked IC-814 plane to Kandahar.
The carrier had earlier given a clean chit to Sharan in a case pertaining to allegations of sexual harassment levelled in July this year by cabin crew head Simrath Chopra without even conducting an enquiry into the case.
But the NCW pursued the matter and directed the airline to initiate a departmental enquiry. It was only after NCW's directive that Air India has now decided to constitute a committee to inquire into it.
Simrath, however, reiterated that she had no faith in the airline's enquiry. "I have no faith in them, especially after they (Air India) gave a clean chit to the pilot earlier without even hearing my case," she said.
Simrath Chopra, the chief of inflight services of Alliance Air, an Air India subsidiary, had claimed that she was demoted by seven ranks to the rank of an entry grade employee after she spurned Sharan's "lewd overtures" in 1996-97.
Subsequently, he had started harassing her. She was demoted to the post of an airhostess after putting in 15 years of service with Air India. Sharan had denied the allegations.
23/11/09 Kavita Chowdhury/India Today.com

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Categories: Air India Regional Nov 2009, NACIL Nov 2009