3-year jail for sexual harassment at work

[Naveed Yaseen]

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Law and Justice on Wednesday recommended a punishment of three years for sexual harassment at the workplace.

The law includes punishment for sexual advances, demands for sexual favours and any written, verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature, which annoys, insults, intimidates or threatens a person at the workplace. The committee met at Parliament House with Begum Nasim Akhtar in the chair and discussed a bill to amend the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and the Code of Criminal Procedure.

It discussed Section 509 of the PPC, to which a proposed new clause, Article 509-A, would be added to provide the punishment for sexual harassment at the workplace. The committee directed to club Section 509 and 509-A together and ratified the bill jointly.

It also took up the Holder of Public Office (Accountability) Act 2009 and approved it unanimously. Under the proposed bill, a special Accountability Commission will be set up for accountability of politicians and bureaucrats that will be headed by a serving or retired judge of the Supreme Court. staff report

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