Sexual harassment: Give them something to complain about

11 Sui Northern employees booked for harassing female customers.

FAISALABAD:

Eleven Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) employees were booked by the Ghulam Muhammadabad police on sexual harassment charges on Wednesday.

According to police officials, the accused SNGPL workers had misbehaved with female customers who had arrived at the Faisalabad offices to inquire about inflated bills.

“They men didn’t just verbally abuse them; they pushed them and beat some of the women,” said an eyewitness Rahman Siddiqui.

Madanpur resident Abdul Wahid alleged in his complaint filed before Ghulam Muhammad Abad police that 11 employees of SNGPL including Muhammad Haneef, Shehbaz and Hayat forced entry into his house on the pretext to rechecking his gas meter reading. “My wife had complained at the offices a day before and they had a heated exchange.

Later he came to my house saying he had come to recheck the meter and revise the reading but he beat my wife and his accomplices tortured us,” he said.

Several eyewitnesses said that they had seen the accused SNGPL officials harass several women at the offices. They said that the officials had then made threatening phone calls to the women.

“They were harassing us because we went there to file a complaint.

They called us up, warning us not to tell anyone,” said an SNGPL consumer Shagufta Kamran. Police officials have registered a case but have yet to arrest any of the accused.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 17^th, 2011.