
CHENNAI: A 52-year-old conservancy worker, belonging to a Scheduled Caste, was allegedly subjected to harassment using sexually abusive language last week by a conservancy supervisor in Sriperumbudur municipality after she allegedly objected to the supervisor asking her to pick up human excreta while cleaning a crematorium.
Based on the complaint by A Gaja, the Sriperumbudur police has booked a case on Saturday against D Sekkizhar, a driver with the municipality who was recently given additional charge as supervisor, under provisions of the SC/ST Prevention of Atrocities Act and Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Women Harassment Act.
The municipality’s Executive Officer (EO) told TNIE that Sekkizhar has now been suspended. The incident happened when Gaja and a few of her colleagues were deputed to clean the crematorium ahead of a visit by the collector and other officials. They removed garbage and dried human excreta.
Sekkizhar, who visited the spot, noticed that a piece of fresh human waste had not been removed. The conservancy staff, led by Gaja, reasoned that the stench was overpowering. To this, he allegedly asked her to pick up that “piece of shit” in Tamil.
When Gaja objected to this language and retorted that they were there to clear garbage and not pick up excreta, Sekkizhar allegedly scolded her in sexually abusive language.
Moreover, the municipality issued a memo to Gaja the following day based on Sekkizhar’s complaint that she was not doing her work properly and was hindering other colleagues.
Alleging that Sekkizhar had been repeatedly using such abusive language against workers, Gaja, who has been a conservancy staff for over 20 years at the municipality, said in her complaint that this was discriminatory towards Dalits. Sekkizhar has not yet been arrested as a detailed probe is under way, a district police official said.