Blitz Bureau
The office of West Bengal Governor C.V. Ananda Bose on July 20 released the preliminary report of an independent in-house judicial inquiry conducted by a retired judge, which termed charges of ‘sexual harassment’ levelled against the Governor by a female contractual employee of the Raj Bhavan ‘baseless’. In the report filed by retired district judge D. Ramabathiran, the possibility of the alleged occurrence on April 24 and May 2 at the Raj Bhavan “as stated by the complainant has been ruled out as baseless allegations”.
Eight staff members of the Raj Bhavan were examined by the retired judge in the course of the probe, including the Governor’s Aide-De-Camp Major Nikhil Kumar. The report said that on May 2, the day when a police complaint was filed against the Governor by the contractual staff of the Governor’s House, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in Kolkata and made a night stay at the Raj Bhavan for which the members of the Special Protection Group (SPG) were already in the city. The report raised questions about the possibility of such an event occurring on that day. The report also mentioned that no woman staff member of the Raj Bhavan expressed any similar apprehension against the Governor.
