Empower # MeToo movement through legislations

Of late, with growing number of women finding opportunities to work in various jobs of their choice along with men, there are obviously many incidents wherein working women are meted out or subjected to harassment in several ways by their male co-workers or bosses at the work place. The working women are either sexually abused or harassed thus causing a trauma against which they long to legally seek a redressal through appealing in a court of law to get necessary justice.

But several victims of sexual assault or harassment especially at the work place have neither an appropriate legal mechanism nor a feasible choice to claim / expose their grievance mainly due to the social stigma such victims are likely to face in the society. In this backdrop, the recently sprung up #MeToo revolution / movement in the country has become a blessing in disguise for women to make out or expose their harassers through the presently widely available or used social media of Facebook or Twitter on the internet that can reach to millions of internet users across the world.

The outing of names of those who indulge in harassment of women with the help of #MeToo movement of the recent times not only sets to defame the accused but also the victims in all likelihood., as it takes an ugly turn on both sides and seldom serves the purpose of punishing the accused as legal redressal against the crime is complicated and delayed depending upon the nature of offence perpetrated by the accused against whom the unproven allegations are often levelled.

The #MeToo movement has spread across India as a wild fire, of late, and a precursor to this movement has emerged from an incident of harassment / sexual abuse took place in the U.S. With a slew of women in the entertainment, media and academic sector outing men who have sexually harassed them in the past, India has finally got its #MeToo moment.

The #MeToo movement in India is an outgrowth influenced by a campaign against sexual harassment of men in the work place, and it is also an offshoot of the American "MeToo" social movement. In fact, there is a gulf of difference the way in which #MeToo concept is legally and socially handled in India as well as in the U.S. This newly evolved concept of #MeToo in India is not any more a trivial issue to be taken in a lighter vein as it kickstarts controversy between the accuser and the accused and despoils their relationship culminating in an irrevocable defamation especially in case of the accused who ought to react suitably to undo his mistake if proved guilty of complaint or allegation levelled against him by the victim.

Unlike as in the past, when the victim who suffered humiliation in the hands of the accused, of late, with the roll-out of #MeToo movement in the present day society wherein social media is explosive, it is the right moment and opportunity for the women harassed at the work place to fearlessly lodge their complaints or allegations against those who abuse or maltreat them in the past or the present so that the latter could claim / seek justice legally against the wrongs committed by the accused. Hence, #MeToo is the only means and a platform for women who are subjected to various kinds of atrocities by men of sorts. Also the government must have a say to mull options to deal with this new concept of #MeToo by involving executive and legislative procedures in addition to the judicial process with which it is mainly dealt with presently.