Nashik BPO case: Nida Khan seeks anticipatory bail in harassment probe

Nida Khan, 26, a an employee of a BPO linked to Tata Consultancy Services in Nashik, moved the Nashik Sessions Court for anticipatory bail on Saturday. Khan’s defence lawyers said she has been falsely implicated in the case and does not have any record of any kind of criminal activity. Khan is one of eight accused in the case relating to alleged sexual harassment and religious coercion at the BPO in Nashik. While seven of the accused have been arrested, Khan eludes law-enforcement authorities, although her family says she is not absconding. All eight employees have been suspended. Khan’s defence lawyers, Rahul Kasliwal and Baba Sayyed, said the court is expected to take up Khan’s anticipatory bail application for hearing on Monday. “She has been falsely implicated in the case. She does not have any record of any kind of criminal activity,” said Kasliwal. The Nashik city police have registered nine FIRs against eight employees of the TCS-linked BPO, including one FIR against Khan. The FIRs were registered in Nashik between March 26 and April 3, following complaints from nine employees, who accused senior colleagues, including team leaders, of alleged sexual abuse, other kinds of harassment and religious coercion. In the FIR against Khan, registered at the Devlali police station, one of the victims has accused her of hurting religious sentiments, making objectionable comments about a Hindu deity. Although initial media reports had claimed that Khan was the HR manager at the BPO, TCS has since issued a statement saying she did not occupy that post and was a “process associate”. Khan’s uncle also told HT on April 17 that after she got married last year, Khan moved to Mumbai in January this year to be with her husband. She had been working at the company’s BPO in Malad, in Mumbai, until her suspension on April 9, her uncle claimed, adding that she is pregnant. The police have set up three teams in Mumbai to trace and arrest Khan, whose family

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