KOCHI: The Kerala Women's Commission on Thursday informed the Kerala High Court that it has requested the state government to constitute an internal complaints committee under the Vishaka guidelines for the Malayalam film industry and enactment of legislation for the benefit of cine employers and employees as a whole.
The application was filed seeking to implead itself in a case filed by the Women in Cinema Collective and others. The Women in Cimema Collective's petition filed in 2018 also sought a directive to constitute an Internal Complaints Committee in AMMA to deal with complaints of sexual harassment following the guidelines in the Vishaka case. The petition alleged that the actors' body has not constituted an Internal Complaints Committee.
The Commission Director Shaji Sugunan said that it had approached the state government and sought to constitute a grievance redressal mechanism in terms of the Vishaka guidelines as well as under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 following the gruesome sexual assault of a woman actor in 2017.
Later, the government constituted a committee headed by Justice K Hema, former judge of the Kerala High Court. The summary of the recommendation of the committee was placed before the Kerala Film Development Corporation, State Chalachitra Academy and Kerala State Cultural Pravarthak Kshemanithy Board for their opinions. The State Chalachitra Academy had sought the constitution of the internal complaints committee.
As the commission was exclusively functioning to address issues for the benefit of women, it requested the court to allow it to implead in the case as an additional respondent. The court allowed the application and posted the hearing of the case to February 14.