Mumbai: A magistrate court in Mumbai Monday directed the Colaba Police to probe a complaint filed by an employee of the central government’s Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) alleging discrimination at work place as she belonged to a Scheduled Caste.
The Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court sought a probe report from the police at the earliest. The court was hearing a complaint filed by Neelima Kadam (52) on May 10, alleging, among other things, that she had been denied a role fit for her at the DAE, and that she had been “demoted” at her job.
In her complaint, Kadam said she joined the DAE in 1988 as a junior stenographer under the SC quota and was dealing, for the last 10-12 years, with work on press releases, public hearings, exhibitions conducted by the department. In September 2016, she was promoted to the post of Personal Assistant, but since she had a degree in mass communication, she had requested the department to give her some “media related” post, she said, adding that the request was denied.
When she took up the matter with then chairperson and secretary of DAE, she was transferred to the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) in July 2017, by re-designating her as a stenographer-II, which is a grade lower in hierarchy to the post she held at DAE, Kadam said in her complaint.
She said replies to her RTI query revealed she had been transferred “suddenly”, without being given a reason, and that the file noting showed the director and joint secretary of the concerned department of DAE had issued orders stating she be removed from her current post immediately. Such remarks, Kadam said, showed that her transfer was malafide. She alleged she was “denied a media related job on account of her belonging to a Scheduled Caste”.