Mysore varsity vice-chancellor ‘soft’ towards sex offender

A woman research scholar at Mysore University’s zoology department has accused the vice-chancellor, VG Talwar, of being ‘soft’ towards the sexual harassment charges she had raised against her professor and guide Dr Shivabasavaiah.

Sarita Vijay Kumar pointed out that in two different cases of sexual harassment in Mangalore University in 2001 and 2010, the guilty were dismissed from the university ranks.

“But in this case, the V-C has just demoted him and relegated him to secondary duties in some other centre. Harassment cannot be viewed differently by different universities,” she argued.

Earlier, Talwar had announced that the university syndicate had taken a decision to cut nine increments of Shivabasavaiah and transfer him to act as an official in the Post Graduate Centre in Chamarajanagar, thus divesting him of all teaching assignments.

Talwar told journalists that the syndicate had found him guilty of sexual harassment and had taken a decision to demote him and also send him out of Mysore.

Saritha, who was working as a research scholar under Shivabasavaiah for the last two years, had complained to the V-C about the sexual harassment by her guide and had stopped going to the university.

The university syndicate met on January 21 and had announced the punishment on January 23 to be carried out with effect from January 24.