Nashik court denies bail to TCS POSH member in sexual harassment case

A Nashik court has refused bail to Ashwini Chainani, TCS site head and POSH committee member, along with four co-accused in the alleged sexual harassment and conversion case. The SIT is probing nine harassment cases at the Nashik unit, with victims also alleging coercion into adopting Islamic practices.

Mumbai: A court in Maharashtra’s Nashik has denied bail to TCS site head and POSH committee member Ashwini Chainani noting that she ‘ignored’ the complaint of a victim in the alleged sexual harassment-conversion case, and thus ‘abetted’ the crime.

Besides Chainani, the court on Friday refused bail to Tausif Attar, Raza Memon, Shahrukh Qureshi and Asif Ansari in the case.

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In the reasoned order, available on Saturday, Additional Sessions Judge V V Kathare said that Chainani’s “silence and insensitivity effectively endorsed the toxic workplace environment”.

Chainani was a member of the Internal Committee of the company, formed under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, commonly known as POSH (Prevention of Sexual Harassment) Act.

Yet, she did not help the victim woman file a complaint in writing as mandated by the Act, the order said.

“On the contrary the act of the applicant would reveal that she had blamed the informant for being in highlight and asked her to let go of the accused,” the judge said.

Chainani was arrested in the case on April 10 for alleged abetment under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. As per the victim, she repeatedly approached Chainani with oral complaints regarding the harassment, but the latter did not take any preventive action.

Defense lawyers argued that Chainani primarily worked from the TCS Pune branch and did not directly supervise day-to-day operations in Nashik. The victim had not submitted a written complaint and thus no formal process had been initiated, they said.

The defence also pointed out the delay in lodging the complaint.

However, the court held that the “victim cannot be blamed for delay in lodging the complaint as she had promptly brought the circumstances to the notice of Chainani, being a member of POSH committee/Internal Committee.”

As per the FIR, Raza Memon and Shahrukh Qureshi tried to develop intimacy with the victim by giving her a word puzzle to solve, asked her personal, intrusive and embarrassing questions, and frequently passed lewd remarks, the court noted.

The atmosphere in the office had become so toxic that the victim resigned in March 2026 just before the FIR was registered, it said.

It was evident that Chainani, despite being a member of POSH Committee, “demonstrated insensitivity to the oral complaints lodged by the victim and thereby not only she has shielded the accused but also abetted them to continue with their acts of sexual harassment”, the court said.

There was “clear evidence of abetment by the applicant”, it said.

Further, as the investigation was at a nascent stage, and considering the “influential nature of the applicant and co-accused”, there is every likelihood of witnesses being influenced and evidence being tampered with if they were released on bail, the court ruled.

The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Nashik police is probing nine cases of alleged harassment at the IT major’s Nashik unit.

Some of the victims also alleged that they were coerced into adopting Islamic practices, including praying, changing dietary habits, and adopting religious symbols.