Action on sexual assaults in Hema committee report only in case of specific complaint: Kerala CM

Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said that no police action will be taken on the basis of the sexual assaults suffered by women that were narrated in the Justice Hema committee report as the committee itself specifically stated that privacy of those who gave statements to the committee should be protected.

However, in case of any specific complaint by any of those victims, the government will take stringent action as it did on various other occasions like the sexual assault on a popular actor in Kochi in 2017, Vijayan said.

He was responding to the criticisms that the government sat on the Hema committee report for nearly five years in order to protect the accused.

Vijayan said that the government was already in the process of initiating various measures to ensure safety of women in the film industry. Steps like setting up tribunal were getting delayed owing to the financial obligations involved.

A committee headed by eminent filmmaker Shaji N Karun was formed to prepare a draft film policy. Financial support is being provided to women filmmakers. Steps to hold a conclave of the film and TV industry to discuss the issues are also progressing.

The Chief Minister said that the entire Malayalam film industry should not be considered as totally undisciplined in view of some instances narrated in the Hema committee report. He asked various forums in the film industry to strongly resist the wrong practices in the industry.

The state government has practical difficulties in interfering into the wage patterns of the film industry, he said.

As the portions of the Hema committee report that came out on Monday contained statements of sexual assaults on artists, including minors, and discrimination suffered by many women in the film industry, there was widespread criticism that the government deliberately sat on the report for nearly five years. Actor turned minister in the CPM government K B Ganesh Kumar was also facing allegations.

Opposition leader V D Satheesan said that the government was indeed trying to protect the identity of the culprits on the pretext of protecting the identity of the victims. He demanded that a special team led by a woman IPS officer should probe the sexual allegations mentioned in the Hema committee report.

Women in Cinema Collective (WCC), a forum of women in the Malayalam film industry which has been pressing the government to take action on the problems faced by women in the Malayalam film industry, expressed hopes that the government would take steps to study and act upon the recommendations. "This is the voice of women and it must be heard," they said in a social media post.