CHAPTER-II

REVIEW OF
LITERATURE

47
 REVIEW OF LITERATURE
In this chapter an attempt is made to review the studies directly and indirectly
related to present research and the reviewed studies are classified and presented as
follows:
a) Studies on sexual harassment of women at work place
b) Studies on the Nature and Extent of sexual harassment of women at work
place
c) Studies on Factors associated with sexual harassment of women at work place
d) Studies on impact of sexual harassment at working women
e) Studies on coping and support mechanism adopted by the women to overcome
the sexual harassment at work place.

2.1 SEXUAL HARASSMENT OF WOMEN AT WORK PLACE

Vibhuti Patel (2010) Sexual harassment at the workplace has been one of the
central concerns of the women‟s movement in India since the ‟80s. Presently,
women‟s groups are lobbying to get the bill on sexual harassment at the workplace,
2005, passed by Parliament. The research article focuses on the genesis and the
utmost need for passing the bill on sexual harassment at the workplace. Several
research surveys carried out on Sexual Harassment at work place has been added to
authenticate the article. The survey conducted by Sakshi Organization (Delhi) throws
up some worrying data i.e. 80% of respondents have revealed that Sexual Harassment
at Work place exists, 49% of the respondent had encountered Sexual Harassment at
Work, 41% had experienced Sexual Harassment at Work, 53% women and men did
not have equal opportunities, 53% were treated unfairly by supervisors, employers
and co-workers, 58% had not heard of the Supreme Court‟s directive of 1997, and
only 20% of organisations had implemented the Vishakha guidelines. Sexual
harassment at the workplace has been regarded as one of the central concerns of the
women‟s movement in India since the ‟80s. Presently, women‟s groups are lobbying
to get the bill on sexual harassment at the workplace, 2005, passed by Parliament.

Bidhu Kishore (2011) revealed in his study that in each of the case the
harassment is by a higher official against a woman official of a lower rank. In most of
the instance the women is harassed for a span of time before seeking help. The
employers and employees of every occupational category are realizing that going to

48
work may be hazardous to one‟s health. Further such violent behaviour may provide
evidence and new meaning to the term “graveyard shift” for many employees
particularly the women employees in the work place. Safe working environment is
very important for the exercise of the basic right to practice any profession.

Dayanand B. Shetty (2014) stated that the problem of increasing sexual

harassment at work places in spite of vigorous laws enforced to tackle the
vulnerability. Sexual harassment is considered as a violation of women's right to
equality, life and liberty, the author elucidates on the aftermath of sexual harassment
which builds an insecure and hostile work environment discouraging women's
contribution in workplace, thereby adversely affecting their social and economic
empowerment and the goal of inclusive growth. He states the primary reasons for
sexual harassment towards women is the gender insensitiveness embedded in the
society. This gender bias towards women is widespread across the nation, religion,
political spectrum and organizations. The author comments on “gender
insensitiveness” as genesis of the problem which needs to be addressed for preventing
the spread of medieval mindset. The author highlights that the real solution lies in
developing a gender sensitive society where women are accorded with dignity and
respect, their opinions to be valued, their rights not violated, and their desires and
aspirations are nurtured and allowed to flourish. He advises serious policy measures
to be backed by the proper implementation of the laws and legislations that will
protect women from sexual harassment and violence in the future.

Lal Bahadur Kunwar (2014) stated that the study was conducted among 92
respondents by using pre-structured interview schedules. Research study reveals that
working women were offended by all form of sexual harassment such as verbal (56.3)
percent, physical (16.9) percent, written or graphical (11.3) percent, gesture (8.5)
percent and emotional (7.0) percent. Hence the author states that 77.2 percent of
women in the work place are subjected to sexual harassment and the cause of
harassment were power and position of male and lack of awareness training among
women. The study further reveals that the major harassers to the women are the co-
workers, immediate supervisor and manager. This negatively impacts their
performance in the work, mental and physical health, their dignity and right.

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2.2 NATURE AND EXTENT OF SEXUAL HARASSMENT OF WOMEN AT
WORK PLACE

Aarti Dhar (2010) revealed regarding the survey that had been carried out by
the Centre for Transforming India, a Non- governmental organisation. This survey
had been done among 600 female working women in IT and BPO industries across all
the major IT destinations of India. The findings of the survey stated that nearly 88
percent of the female work force in Indian information technology and business
process outsourcing and knowledge process outsourcing (BPO/KPO) companies have
reported having suffered from some form of work place sexual harassment during
their work. More than 50 per cent of women in these companies revealed that
harassment was extreme, abusive language, physical contact or demands for sexual
favours. 72 per cent of the incidents involved superiors. 42 per cent of the respondents
have said that they did not know how to report the incident of sexual harassment, 60
percent of the women were not aware of the work place sexual harassment policies of
their organisations and 77 percent of the women have said that the details regarding
sexual harassment policies were not part of their hiring process. Furthermore, the
article revealed that workplace sexual harassment has been a vital problem for female
employees working across industries especially in the service sector because these
service industry faces confront of working 24X7 which entails working at odd hours
for the female employees which in turn leads to sexual harassment at work place.

Unnikrishnan (2010) revealed that the study was done with the sample of 160
women in simple random sampling method focusing on socio-demographic profile,
their perception of harassment, their personal experience and the awareness regarding
anti- harassment policies. The findings of the study reveal that harassment occurs
more among the younger respondents as compared to the older respondents. The
author has stated that out of 160 working women 28.8 percent of women were
harassed, the reason perceived by 45.7 percent women as the cause of such
harassment were they were being more efficient in their jobs and 23.9 percent have
stated that being beautiful than their male counter parts as another cause for
harassment in the work place. majority 47.8 percent of the respondent were harassed
within one year of joining their employment.

50
 Sudha Arogya Mary (2012) highlighted the problem relating to stress, health
and work place issues. The study came out with the fact that 75 percent of the
employees have felt that they have problem because of night shifts. 65 percent of the
respondent had lot of health problem because of night shift. 50 percent of the
employees felt that they experienced backache due to night shift. 67.5 % of the
respondent reported that above 4 employees left their job due to difficulties faced
during night shift. 45 % of women experienced stress during work because of timing.
Therefore, the study concludes that the organization should take a note of its
employee‟s welfare to reduce the problem of stress among employees.

Premilla D Cruz; Charlotte Rayner (2012) stated that the present article
ascertains the presence of work place bullying, the influence of socio cultural factors,
and the nature of bullying category. In this study data were collected through
structured interviews incorporating the work harassment scale. The study was
conducted among 1036 respondents. The findings of the study reveal the fact that
44.3% of the respondents has experienced bullying, 19.7% of the respondent have
reported moderate and severe levels. In keeping with India‟s hierarchical society
superiors emerged as the predominant source of bullying, displaying task focused
behaviours. Hence with the presence of India‟s ITES-BPO/Offshoring-outsourcing
industry work place harassment scale it has provided evidence of the existence of
bullying in the present study. Further the study adds evidence that work place bullying
is present across the globe. At the same time, it highlights various details within the
Indian situation that warrant investigation.

Xiaobing Zhang, Zewei Zhang (2012) revealed in this study that the
questionnaire of previous international research literature had been used and it had
been further modified by the interview and again later it was modified by using the
scale to test the reliability and validity. The present study reveals that sexual
harassment is more prone to occur in the place where there is a lack of traditional
system and protection. The findings of study further revealed that 54 percent of
women have experienced verbal or attitude harassment in the corporate workplace.
The principal forms of sexual harassment takes place in the work environment were
mostly verbal harassment and 20 percent of women have experienced physical
behaviour and 8 percent of the women have faced exchange condition in the work

51
place. Hence sexual harassment in corporate sector has increased high up. Verbal
sexual harassment has become a common way of harassment for women in the
workplace. Most of the working women require the company competent department
or the police to solve the problem.

Abhinav Bhatt (2013) has stated in the NDTV News Article that IT
outsourcing company iGate Corp had dismissed its chief executive Phaneesh Murthy
one of the biggest names in the IT world, for not disclosing a relationship with a
subordinate after investigating him for sexual harassment. Article states that Sexual
harassment at work place is rampant but no one talks about it. According to a survey
officially just 17 percent of working women in major cities have admitted to sexual
harassment at the work place. But on the condition of anonymity 88 percent of
women in IT Company revealed they have faced some form of sexual harassment. In
Bangalore the software capital of India over 700 complaints were filed with the
Karnataka Labour Department. The grab holds of all of them were unofficial that is
they came in the form of anonymous emails, letters and complaints without full
details of the cases.

Laura Bates (2013) has stated in the guardian news that sexual harassment in
the work place is endemic. Workplace harassment is viewed as one of the most
common issues which was reported by every day sexism project. In this article it had
been stated that a new study by law firm Slater and Gordon had revealed that one in
six women have reported that their colleagues looked down their blouse, almost half
of the women have experienced comments about their breasts in the work place and
one in eight have left jobs because work place harassment has made them feel so
uncomfortable. The study suggests that sexual harassment in the work place is rife
among both men and women with almost 40% of men also reporting experiences. The
study states that the work place harassment is one of the most difficult and insidious
issues to tackle because the victims are so often in a position of vulnerability, afraid of
damaging their careers or even losing their jobs. The sarcasm is that the woman who
experiences these harassments are tolerated and brushed under the carpet due to
normalisation and a culture of acceptance.

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 Sumitra Ahlawat (2013) stated that alarming number of women has reported
sexual harassment in the form of unwanted touch and sexual gesture and
exhibitionism while others have reported the experience in the form of verbal or
psychological. despite the number of women experienced sexual harassment they
never reported and took formal action against the offender. Steps taken in these cases
were by and large indirect and rarely involved confronting the perpetrator or take
action to dismiss him.

Jyothsna Latha Belliappa (2013) stated that harassment and power are closely
related. The researcher has adopted a qualitative research to explore women‟s
experiences of sexual harassment in the IT industry. This article had tried to explore
the cultural norms regarding women‟s behaviour which can influence management‟s
attitudes to sexual harassment complaints. The article states that the younger working
women and the women in Non-management positions are more prone to sexual
harassment risk than the older women. IT companies had constituted committees to
investigate complaints of sexual harassment but their investigations are often
influenced by normative ideas of appropriate female behaviour. The article further
states that the influence of culture is evident in the way women respond to
harassment. Irrespective of whether they are recipients or investigators women tend to
believe that harassment can be avoided or curtailed through tact and firmness. This
belief can indirectly strengthen the position of perpetrators and prevent women from
making a formal complaint in the IT Sector. Hence the written policies may constitute
a vital step towards creating a conducive work environment for women.

Fapohunda Tinuke Moradeke (2014) had stated in his research Article that
female workers perceived and experienced various moulds of sexual harassment such
as symbolic, verbal, electronic and physical forms of sexual harassment. The highest
prevalence of harassment experienced by women was physical, verbal and non-verbal
harassment. This situation of harassment is associated with the power relation that
exists between the men as holders of formal power which confers on them a superior
status over female employee in the work place. This study further demonstrates that
female employees constitute the targets of various forms of sexual harassment and
they should contend with the privileges patriarchy confers on males as power brokers
in the work place. Hence the author states that sexual harassment taking place in the

53
work place needs to be prevented since majority of the victims are women who are
prone to such harassments in the work place and this creates a barrier in their proper
integration into the labour market.

The Economic times 2014 has stated in “Rise in sexual harassment cases at
workplace: Government” that the number of complaints registered with the
National Commission for Women (NCW) concerning sexual harassment of women at
work places has been showing an increasing trend lately. This information was also
been shared in Lok Sabha by Women and Child Development Minister Maneka
Gandhi she stated that "The number of complaints of sexual harassment of women at
work places registered with National Commission of women shows that there is an
increasing trend” As per the data provided by her there were 336 complaints of sexual
harassment at workplace registered in NCW (National Commission for Women) up to
December 12, 2014. There were 249 such cases registered in 2013, 167 in 2012 and
170 in 2011 with the NCW, as per the data provided by the minister.

Richa Sharma (2014) has revealed regarding a survey that was conducted by
Nimbuzz, a cross platform mobile calling and messaging app, in that survey it has
been found that the Indian women felt that they did not have safety at their workplace.
The survey reveals that 47 percent of women felt their top issue at work place is
sexual harassment vis-a-vis inequality in pay and unequal opportunities. The report
further states that not only women but even men feel that sexual harassment is one of
the common problems for working women. 51 percent of male colleagues feel that
their female colleagues have faced sexual harassment in one way or the other such as
looks, lewd remarks, intentional touching and end up into anything- right from open
invitation to have sex to rape, depending on the person involved. It has also been
found that the executive stalkers are using innovative way to hit on their female
colleagues like forwarding flirtatious texts through what‟s APP, BBM (BlackBerry
Messenger) among others. The report reveals that 58 percent of women claim that
most of the cases happen via sms/ text.

Geeta M Jaisingh, Jaya Mathew (2014) has stated in his research article that
the corporate sector in India has not been very approachable to women‟s complaints
about the sexual harassment at the work place. This article stresses on the employer‟s

54
responsibility to follow the legal requirements prescribed by the Act. The article also
touches upon the importance of workplace policies on sexual harassment and the role
of human resource (HR) departments. The findings of this study reveal that women
who worked in private sector had experienced the harassment in the form of filthy
telephone calls at the office and home thereby causing physical and psychological
harassment to the respondent. The study states that the issue of sexual harassment at
work place remains “hidden” problem in India because victims may be shy or
ashamed or may not know what to do about the problem of sexual harassment
happening in the work place. Thus, the problem of sexual harassment in the work
place still remains as a hidden fact in the Indian society.

Edison Nesa Doss; Pavan K Mukherjee (2014) conducted a Descriptive study

which investigated the prevalence of sexual harassment and its impact among working
women. The result of this study indicated that 20 to 30 percent of working women
have faced the problem of vulgar words. 50 percent of the working women have faced
the unwelcome word like „Darling‟ in the work place. The study reveals that working
women not only face this kind of problems but they are also pampering to face
intrusive question about their personal sexual life and they were made to repeatedly
look at sexually explicit image or pictures and shown obscene sexual gesture. The
study shows a shocking finding that 10 percent of the working women have stated that
they were forcibly kissed and 17 percent reported that they were forcibly hugged
which was very disturbing and hurting for them. The research states that women who
face more harassment at work place were unmarried who were affected by
unwelcome physical contact. 40 percent of the working women were in the opinion of
resigning their job because of harassment. The study shows that majority 77 percent
of the women were not aware of the sexual harassment act 2012. Hence the research
clearly indicates that sexual harassment is still a problem in the work place and the
reason for prevalence of this problem is the lack of awareness among the working
women.

Rica Bhattacharyya (2015)Stated that according to a FICCI-EY (Federation of

Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry – Ernst & Young) Report fostering safe
work places indicates that nearly 36 percent of Indian companies and 25companies
among MNCS are not complaint with the sexual harassment act 2013, the sexual

55
harassment cases at the work place has seen a noticeable rise in 2014, according to the
National Commission for Women (NCW) in the year 2013 there was 249 complaints,
the same doubled in the year 2014 to 526 complaints. With regard to this the present
study tried to identify the changing dynamics of the workforce with regard to
prevention of sexual harassment of women. The study reveals that 31 percent of the
respondents were not complaint with the act (after its enactment) which mandates
Internal Complaint Committee (ICC) being constituted to address complaints. About
40 percent of the respondents are yet to train their ICC members. Indian company
fared low with 47 percent on the other hand MNC stood at 34 percent nearly 35
percent of companies surveyed were unaware of the penal consequences for non-
compliance when constituting ICCS. Surprisingly the issue was more pronounced
among MNCs with almost 38 percent stating their ignorance. SME (Small and
Medium Sized Enterprises) sector fared low with 71 percent did not display such
warnings clearly at their place.

Kiran Kabtta Somvanshi (2015) revealed that two third of companies on the
weighted average of 50 stock benchmark index of the NSE(National Stock Exchange)
reported cases of sexual harassment. According to a study by the ET (Economic
Times) intelligence group an examination of the annual reports of 46 nifty companies
showed a total of 415 cases with 80 percent of these in information technology (IT)
and Wipro heads the list with 100 cases. In the manufacturing sector where women
are less well represented, Tata Steel leads with 24 cases followed by Cipla with 17
cases. The IT Sector has a higher proportion of women in the work force than other
sectors. A greater number of cases do not mean that the work place in such companies
is less safe it also reflects an enabling culture that emboldens women to complain
against harassment rather than stay silent and suffer because of lack of support.
Further the author states that in the Indian context there is still a lot of stigma, victim
shaming, aggrieved individuals‟ fear being retaliated against or isolated in the
organisation and practical societal implications associated with being a victim of
sexual harassment prevents women employees from approaching the internal
complaints committee, Besides this now it is encouraging to be noted that the
companies are now reporting the cases of sexual harassment more in the form of
paper complaints.

56
 Piyush Pandey (2015) stated that overall 31 percent of the respondents were
not compliant with the Act after its enactment which mandates internal complaints
committee being constituted to address complaints. According to a report titled
“Fostering Safe workplaces” complied by FICCI-EY (Federation of Indian Chambers
of Commerce & Industry – Ernst & Young) Total of 249 complaints were registered
in 2013. The report commissioned to identify the changing dynamics of the workforce
with regards to prevention of sexual harassment of women, the report revealed that
uncertainty, caution and introspection were highly prevalent among companies. The
report revealed that 40 percent of the total respondents were yet to train their
committee members. Indian companies fared low with 47 percent while multinational
companies stood at 34 percent.

Vishal Saurav (2016) has revealed that about 53 percent of working women
felt insecure especially during night shifts and most of these women were employed
in the IT and BPO. The working women are concern with the safety norms setup by
their respective establishment were not adequate and this has given rise to crime,
insecurity and fear that were only going up. Author has revealed that the Assocham
Social Foundation (ASDF) had carried out an assessment revealing that 48 percent of
women who were engaged in the small-scale sector are extremely worried about their
safety and nearly 26 percent in the medium sector and 23 percent in the large sector
establishment were scared to step out after the sun sets. The fast-growing IT and BPO
has generated parallel employment for cab drivers who have often been responsible
for rash driving, accidents, eve teasing, rape and even murder. 86 percent of women
working on the night shifts face commuting problems because of lack of adequate
transport arrangements by employers. The study also states that there are around
2,200 IT firms in Bangalore of which 1,600 are registered with the department. In
Bangalore around 56 percent of women working in IT sector night shift felt unsafe.
Delhi has topped the list with 65 percent followed by 35 percent in Hyderabad, 28
percent in Chennai and 26 percent in Mumbai.

Salvador Rodriguez (2016)stated that more than one-half of all women

working in the Technology industry have experienced sexual harassment. A new
study The “Elephant in the valley” which covers more than 200 women in the tech
industry with at least 10 years of experience in tech and encompassed several higher-

57
ups- and 25 percent women held C-suite positions at their companies were taken for
the study. The study founded out that 60 percent of women working in the tech have
reported unwanted sexual advances. These advances had came from superiors. The
study further states that thirty nine percent of the women had not reported the
incidents because this report will negatively impact their career. While 60 percent of
the working women who had reported the sexual harassment, problem felt dissatisfied
by the results. Among other notable findings were 90 percent of the women witnessed
sexual behaviour at company conferences or offsite meetings;87 percent of the
women had experienced demeaning comments by male colleagues;66 percent felt
excluded from key networking opportunities because of their gender. Hence the
author alleged that many working women had shared the similar work place stories
which most of the men were simply shocked and unaware of the issues facing women
in the work place.

Steve Doughty (2016) stated that the research had been carried out by YouGov
in January by using answers from 1,533 women. This research had come out with the
findings that 52 percent of the women had suffered from sexual harassment at work.
Almost third women had subjected to unwelcome Sexual jokes, 28 percent had
received sexual comments about their body or clothes, and one in five had
experienced unwanted verbal advances and 3 percent said that the sexual harassment
happened in the past 12 months. Most of the women have said that harassment they
experienced appeared to feel like it was of minor importance. Fifth of those polled
was that it had embarrassed them. A tenth of women had said that it had made them
change work habit by avoiding some places or times and one in 14 said it made them
less confidence. Further the article states that one in seven incidents were away from
offices, workshops or factories- occurring on occasions such as conference or work
Christmas parties.

Kristen Bellstrom (2016) has stated that new survey titled “The Elephant in the
Valley” has been conducted among 200 women who had 10 years of experience in
tech industry in order to perceive the sexual harassment in the tech industry. The
survey came out with the findings that 60% of the women have reported that they
have experienced unwanted sexual advances.65% of women have reported that at
least one advance have came from a superior. One of the respondent have stated that

58
first time when she travelled with a new CEO he propositioned the respondent and
this impacted the ability to do the job properly. Further many women 39% have said
that they did not report the harassment due to the fear that it would hurt their careers.
Of those 60% of the women who reported the problem of sexual harassment stated
that they were unsatisfied by the action that was taken by the officers.66% of the
women have said that they were excluded from important social and or networking
events. Nine out of ten respondents have revealed that they have experienced sexist
behaviour at conferences and company offsite and more than 80% of the women had
dealt with demeaning comments from male colleagues. Finally, three out of four
women had said that they have been asked about the family life, kids or marital status
in an interview which made the respondents to suffer terribly.

Apoorva Mandhani (2016) had stated regarding the survey report conducted
by INBA (Indian National Bar Association) on “Sexual Harassment at Work place”
during the period of April 2016 to October 2016. This survey had been carried out
among 6047 participants both male and female and 45 victims both male and female
respondents working in sectors such as BPOs, IT, education, legal and hospital. The
result of this survey affirms that of the total 38 percent of the respondent have
experienced sexual harassment at work place, while 50.7% has said that they had been
targets of online or social networking. 42.2 percent of the victims had complained of
undergoing stigma attached with the abuse. The Indian National Bar Association
(INBA) survey had also revealed that the national Capital has become the most
unpleasant city for female workers, followed by Mumbai and Bangalore. Therefore,
the survey concludes that sexual harassment is that ground where the power in the
hands of the harasser with full of aggression and is all set to intimidate abuse and
degrade the victim. Report further summarise that the biggest obstacles in accepting
the very truth of sexual harassment by the respondents were due to stigma attached
with sexual harassment, ignorance and misinformation altogether had made the
women to suffer in silence and prevents women from gathering the courage to report
the incidents.

Rameez Anjum (2016) has stated that 93% of the women have faced sexual
harassment in various forms but most of the women are scared of complaining
because responses are always delayed. The author states that 79 women have filed a

59
complaint against their male colleagues. According to the recent research conducted
by „Alliance against Sexual Harassment (AASHA) in 2009 revealed that almost
93percent of the women have confronted different forms of sexual harassment at their
work place in both private and public-sector organization. According to the Statistics
obtained from Ministry of Planning and Development, women have constituted about
51 percent of the total population and about 22.7 percent of women is labour force.
According to official figures released by the Ministry of Human Rights 8,648
incidents of human rights violation have been reported in the country during January
2012 to September 15, 2015. Of those 268 cases were related to sexual harassment or
assault against women. In this article it has been said that women are not yet fully
aware of the problem and even the government does not seem serious in solving it.
Further the author states that in this modern age women taking part in the economic
race alongside men, are taken as commodity. Any women who raises the voice against
sexual harassment is considered a characterless women and this seem to be the biggest
reason why the women withdraw complaints

Anish Raj (2017) has stated that most sexual harassment occurs at work places
and it was observed that 68.9% of the victims do not lodge a complaint against the
sexual harassment because of the fear retaliation, repercussions and sympathy with
the offender. The author has further stated in this article that a study has been
conducted by the Indian National Bar Association (INBA) an association of lawyers
in Ahmedabad, bengaluru, Guwahati,Hyderabad, Kolkata,Lucknow,Mumbai,New
Delhi and Pune across firms covering the BPO, IT sector, education, legal, hospital,
food processing and agriculture, manufacturing and labour sectors. The participants in
this survey were 78% women and 22% men. In this survey it has been stated that most
sexual harassment cases occur at the work places and 68.9% of the victims do not
lodge a complaint against the offender because of the fear, embarrassment, lack of
confidence in the compliant mechanism and stigma attached to sexual harassment
were seem to be the reason for the women not complaining about the incidents of
sexual harassment in the work place. According to the findings it was found that most
companies were unaware of the correct mechanism under sexual harassment of
women at work place (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013. The survey
further states that around 65% of the respondents have affirmed that the organization
had not followed the procedure under the law while 60% of the respondents have said

60
that sexual harassment continued for less than six months in their work place.28.9%
of the women have reported that the sexual harassment incident continued in their
workplace for more than a year and this sexual harassment that happened in the work
place were in the form of sexism (touching oneself while looking at females), lewd
comments, inappropriate touching, asking for sexual favors and physical harassment.
Despite awareness of sexual harassment being high 42.2% of the women felt that
there were no enough legal protection for sexually harassed employees and 46.7% had
felt that legal protection existed but not in an organized manner. Therefore even
though there is law for sexual harassment the problem still remains rampant and
women still faces this problem in the work place. It is not only fear but also due to
character assassination indulged by the co-employees makes the women employees
not to prefer a complaint and get accustomed to live with that for their own survival.

Mishra Kushendre, Singh Pooja (2017) has revealed in his study that the
corporate sector have grown steadily over the past decades with larger proportion of
men than women. The findings of the study stated that 30 percent of the workforce in
the IT/ITeS (Information Technology Enabled Service) sector comprises of women.
This proportion has indicated that the significant numbers of women are prone to
unique set of challenges in the work place simply because of their gender. Significant
number women have stated that discrimination was started from the very first stage
which is recruitment for working women. The other common forms of discrimination
that these women faced are equal remuneration, sexual harassment, discrimination
due to pregnancy, disability, and caste or religion. Therefore the study concludes that
the Indian society being traditionally patriarchal in nature had extended its nature to
the work place as well which extensively address the varied dimensions of inequality
faced by women. Study further concludes that the employer may consider stipulating
policies in terms of ensuring equal employment opportunitities for women and to
prohibit harassment and discrimination at the work place.

2.3 FACTORS ASSOCIATED WITH SEXUAL HARASSMENT OF

WORKING WOMEN IN IT SECTOR
Mohd Nazari Ismail et.al (2007) conducted a research study here the
researcher had adopted a questionnaire survey for gathering the primary data for this
study. The survey focused on women as the unit of study as they face the risk of being

61
sexually harassed more frequently than men. Study was conducted among 657 women
employees working in Malaysian organization. This study examined the potential
risks factors associated with sexually harassing behaviours. The factors examined are
unprofessional work environment, skewed gender ratio in the workplace, knowledge
of grievance procedure for sexual harassment, sexist attitudes among co-workers,
privacy of workspace, physical attractiveness, dress manner of victims, job status, and
sex roles. Research findings reveals that the factor associated with sexual harassment
are unprofessional atmosphere, males who are sexist in their attitudes are more likely
to encounter sexually harassing behaviours and those who are more knowledgeable
about grievance procedures are also more likely to interpret negative behaviours of
male colleagues as being sexually harassing behaviours and the more provocative a
woman dresses the more likely she is going to be sexually harassed. Hence the
occurrence of sexual harassment in the workplace at all occupational levels incur
some form of cost to companies, as the morale and interpersonal relationships among
co-workers suffer. This in turn has serious implications on the team spirit and
cooperation of employees. In the long-term, aggravated by the departure of competent
workers, the competitive advantage of the corporation will ultimately be affected.
Furthermore, sexual harassment is an indication of unequal power between male and
female workers, implying women's subordinate status in the organization and society
in general.

Rebecca S. Merkin (2012)stated that the younger employees are more prone to
greater incidents of sexual harassment than older employees and the odds of
experiencing sexual harassment have been 1.12 times higher if the person has more
education than if a person has less education. Further the study result showed the fact
that the people of minority races are exposed to more sexual harassment than people
of majority races. The study concludes that the proposed antecedents represented that
low sociocultural power are associated with an increased likelihood of being sexually
harassed in the work place. Hence understanding the cultural values is a starting point
for determining the elements necessary to improve communicative interactions in the
global work place of the future.

Deepa Kurup (2013) stated in the Hindu News Article that “Security for
Women Working In Small IT Firms Still Lacking” that many IT working women in

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Bangalore are not provided with the safe environment as compared to Delhi and
Chennai which leads to sexual harassment. A recent Associated Chambers of
Commerce and Industry survey found that productivity levels of women in the IT
sector had fallen by a third after the Delhi rape incident and that Bangalore which has
over 1,800 BPO/ITeS units is the worst affected. The survey which has been
dismissed by a section of the industry says that their commutes are bad and unsafe.
Due to this factor many women working in the IT sector have said that Bangalore did
not provide a safe enough environment for the working women though it was
relatively better off compared to cities such as Delhi and Chennai.

Varun Kapoor, Kanika Dhingra (2013)analysed the various aspects of sexual

harassment offences which have led to the growing harassment of women. The author
statedthat women have been made to face all kinds of violence, physical abuse, denial
of rights to live, subordination and neglect and along with this the study also includes
the various causes that leads to an increase in the number of sexual abuses and rape
against women. They include: lack of awareness, illiteracy, upbringing of the abusers,
their inability to appreciate the feminine glory of women. In this study an emphasis
has also been laid on the possible emotional, psychological and mental impacts which
may suffer by the women. The author has stated that the major causes for sexual
harassment against women are the role of men and women in the society were seen as
a term of domination and subordination. Women were perceived to be submissive and
were kept under the control and supervision of men. Another reason for the growth of
sexual harassment were the inability or the denial of the female victims to report the
cases of sexual harassment due to the fear that the society would look upon them in
disregard and the proceedings launched by the women would cause them harassment
when personal and unsolicited questioning will be made to the women. Apart from
this the study also states that men overpower women to prove their strength over the
opposite gender. Some other reasons for these offences may also include revenge,
hatred or mere pleasure towards women leads to harassment in the work place. Thus,
the author concludes that the growing menace of physical and sexual abuse against
women needs to be addressed immediately. The society and the government should
make the necessary efforts in bringing in and enforcing specific laws targeting the
issues relating to sexual abuse. The media were also given importance in sensitizing
the women about their rights and the remedies available to them. The author further

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affirmed that there is need to bring strict enforcement of the existing laws so as to
ensure proper security to women. The enactment of the Criminal LawAct, 2013 as a
major achievement of the Indian legislature as it has incorporated various necessary
provisions and has also made the punishment more strict and grave. However, the
instances of crimes are still being reported. This showed that the existing frame work
were not sufficient to deal with the problem of harassment against women.

Maryam Maktoobian(2014)stated that the purpose of the study was to

explore women‟s experiences regarding sexual harassment at work place. The aim of
this study deals with women‟s feeling of insecurity at work place by means of
qualitative approach. The present study consists of 20 female employees and data
collection tools included was semi structured and in-depth interview and participant
observation techniques were used to collect the data. The finding of the study reveals
that Sexual harassment and feeling of insecurity are a manifestation of gender
inequality at macro level. The situation of workplace and lifestyle (behavioural
manifestation and physical appearance), gender stereotypes and imbalanced power
relationships are among the most important reasons that make women feel insecure at
workplace. The study concludes that despite of being undeniably available such
problems are social taboo in our society and bring labelling, stigma and dishonour for
engaged people. Therefore because of the stigmatizing nature of these issues women
who are subject to sexual harassment prefer to stay silent and not report such
problems. The present study also states that single and younger women are more
exposed to sexual harassment and feeling of insecurity compared to the older women.
The most frequent forms of harassment taken place in the organization were oral and
speaking interactions.

Sonia(2015) stated in her research article that complaints of sexual harassment

at the work place are often ignored as minor misconduct rather than reported as
serious crimes that carry a penalty. The incidence of sexual harassment at work place
is increasing day to day. Harassment affects all women in some form or the other.
Women are vulnerable to sexual harassment because of the factor that they more often
lack power and work in insecure positions. Often women are not aware of the legal
remedy at their disposal. Due to the fear factor women often resign to their fate rather
than raise voice against sexual harassment. The author states that the victims hide the

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problem that happens in the work place due to several reasons such as feeling of
shame, fear of what society would think of them, the fear of losing the job and also
the feeling that the culprits would walk away without any punishment. All this makes
the women to seclude the problem of sexual harassment in the work place.

Denise Salin(2015)analysed the Risk factors in a large, nationally

representative sample of Finnish employees. This study had made three important
contributions to the existing literature on workplace bullying First it demonstrates the
role of the physical work environment alongside the psychosocial work environment-
employees with a poor physical work environment are more likely than others to
report having been subjected to or having observed bullying. The findings of this
study reveal that high demands, coupled with low control seem to increase the risk of
stress and high time pressures lower the threshold for aggression and allow less time
for constructive problem solving. Not only the victims have reported an association
between being bullied and a stressful work environment also self-reported bullies
work in environments characterized by role conflict and interpersonal conflicts. Non-
bullied colleagues in the organizations with high bullying levels also report higher
work and performance demands than employees in departments with less bullying.
The result of this study strongly supports that a relationship between a poor physical
work environment where the male dominated and male gender typed work places has
been associated with an elevated risk of bullying. Regarding the psycho social work
environment, the results confirmed the importance of both leadership and job
demands. The author states that the respondents having high levels of job demands
reported an almost four times higher risk of bullying than those with low job
demands. Hence the physical work environment has the potential to cause frustration
for women in the work place because physical and the psychosocial work
environment appear to provide support for the work environment but the poor work
environment such as heat, poor ventilation, cramped spaces, poor lightening and noise
makes the performance of the work difficult for the women in the work place which in
turn creates stress and frustration among the women in the work place.

Rizwana Yousaf, Rudi Schmiede(2016)revealed in his findings that 17.8%

of the participants have said that the cause for sexual harassment were women‟s
provocative dressing which led to harassment and which actually invites such

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behaviour. At the same time 14.8 % of the respondents‟ opinion were makeup invites
men to pass the comments or say something about their appearance. Whereas 17.5%
of the participants have reported that women‟s patriarchal mindset simultaneously
could be important for such experience. One could assume that man wants to suppress
or dominates over the women but on the other hand women provide such
opportunities by dressing up in a way which might not be approved in the society.

Bajaj Yamini (2017) has examined the factors that encourage sexual
harassment in the work place. The author revealed that the factors that are responsible
for sexual harassment at work place were age of the women that is teenagers were
more prone to harassment; sensual dressing styles and alcohol encouraged the
problems to happen at the work place. Author has stated that women at the nightshift
were more prone to harassment problems and media opening society towards making
women more vulnerable. The result of this factor indicated these factors are mainly
responsible for encouraging sexual harassment of women at work place. Further the
findings of the study highlighted that women face sexual harassment problems at
work place which further leads to stress that affects personal life and professional life.
It creates a fear of personal security and fear of losing job. Thus, it was suggested that
the employer need to focus on special training and awareness programs for employees
to prevent sexual harassment at work place.

2.4 IMPACT OF SEXUAL HARASSMENT ON THE WORK,

PRODUCTIVITY AND MORALE OF THE WORKING WOMEN IN IT
SECTOR
Stress Exhibited by the Individual because of Sexual Harassment:
Jeremy Stranks (2010) states that working women are subjected to many
stressors at work which are not suffered by their male counterparts. The author states
that a common cause for stress is sexual harassment the state of tension coupled with
apprehension, worry, guilt, insecurity and a constant need for reassurance. This
condition is accompanied by psychosomatic symptoms such as profuse perspiration,
difficulty in breathing, gastric disturbances, rapid heartbeat, frequent urination,
muscle tension or high blood pressure. Author further stated that harassment may not
only result in physical form it may take the form of psychological arising from verbal
threats, persistent verbal abuse, bullying, obstruction, mocking behaviour and an

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attempt by an individual perhaps a senior manager or the other person in authority.
Hence inevitably the victim feels at the danger, worried and weak, and may suffer
from shock and in some cases may require long standing psychological treatment.

Jason N. Houle et.all (2011) stated in his study that sexual harassment has
been theorized as a stressor with consequences for the physical and mental health of
its targets. The findings of the study confirm that sexual harassment is a stressor that
is associated with increased depressive symptoms. The result of this study states that
women who experience more frequent sexual harassment at work have significantly
higher levels of depression mood than no harassed workers. Moreover, the author
found the evidence that sexual harassment early in the career has long term effects on
depressive symptoms in adulthood. The result of this interview examines that the
three patterns emerged from this study analysis are characterized by mixed feelings,
self-doubt and anger. Respondents who expressed mixed feelings were upset by the
harassment and they felt strong about wanting to keep their jobs even in the face of
ongoing harassment. Others have said that they blamed themselves for the harassment
they experienced. Another group of interview participants have placed the blame
more directly on their harasser and felt angry. Further the study findings reveal that a
woman who experiences the harassment experience heightened emotional distress
later in their career in part because their early harassment experiences increase their
risk of being targets of harassment throughout their career. This harassment may also
lead to stress in other domains such as family conflict or negative stressful life events.

Veeramani (2012) conducted a study in order to identify various problems

and personal consequences faced by women employees in IT industry and to identify
physical distress and psychological problems faced by woman in the work
environment. The findings of the study reveals the fact that 60 percent of the
respondent have reported that they are affected by physical problems like backache,
75 percent respondent said they had shoulder pain, 65 percent respondent said that
they had the problem of blood pressure, 70 percent reported the problem of eye
problems, 69 percent respondents felt angry and irritable and continual tiredness by 65
percent. out of total respondents 60 percent are affected by psychological problems
like anxiety, 66 percent depression, faulty eating habits 59 percent, mental tension 48
percent, mental illness 47 percent, sleep disturbance 60 percent, Fear about future 40

67
percent, feel of insecurity at work place 42 percent. The demand for IT services has
increased considerably over the years due to easy accessibility and wide range
products offered by the IT industry. IT industry is a major and fastest growing
industry in the country. It is an open truth that working women in this sector have to
face these problems just by virtue of their being women.

Neeru Garg (2014) stated that the two most important aspects in women‟s lives
are work and family. The working mother has many facets in their lives that are
subject to stresses. The author states the consequence of the stress are physical and
psychological the physical consequences are headaches, stomach problems, eating
disorder, sleep disturbances, fatigue, muscle aches and pains, high blood pressure,
heart disease and psychological stress are serious depression, inefficiency in work,
suicidal behaviour, anxiety, irritability, low morale, depression, and feeling
powerless. The author suggest solution to the problem of occupational stress of
working women in India lie in the change of traditional mind- set of the society that
male are the bread winners and females are the house- keepers. So, there is a need to
change the attitude of the employers, policy makers, politicians and family members.
They should provide the tension free environment to working women at place of work
as well as at home.

Krishnamurthy,S.Prabakaran (2015)revealed that the female employees are

having more stress impact in the work as compared to male employees. Further the
study signifies the facts that the married women are having high level stress factors
relating to work, personal stress factors, stress factors related to environment and
stress factor related to self-respect. However, the unmarried employees are having
more reasons for work stress, organizational stress factors, and health stress factors as
compared to married employees. Overall the study reveals that IT sector is found to be
more stressful and the females are highly affected by the stress factors such as work,
health, as they are more emotional in nature. Hence the stress level is same for all the
IT company but the only one or two factors can cause the difference in result.
Prakash B Kundaragi, AM Kadakol (2015) has stated in his research study that
sexual harassment has become common in all work places which creates stress among
the working women. Stress can be the psychological and physiological reaction which
takes place at the work place, which is in the result of imbalance in employees work

68
life and personal life of the employees. The author states that stress at work place not
only causes because of time pressure and over load of work but also lack of rewards,
co-operation of co-workers, work environment, pressure from the top management,
role ambiguity and role conflict creates more stress among the working women. Stress
has been an unavoidable in the organizational work life and it had become a Black
plague at a work place and getting more and more attention in the work place which
in turn leads to Absenteeism, turnover, low productivity, and poor concentration at the
place of work.

Impact of sexual harassment on work

Bastin Jerome.V (2010) highlighted the organizational and work related
stressors. In his study it had been observed that various physical illnesses are being
experienced by the employees. In that 76% of the respondents admitted that they have
eye sight problem which has been ranked first and depression as a cause for illness
where 72% of the respondents experienced due to overwork load. 56 % of the
respondents were tied up with a lot of worries about their future job. 73% of the
respondent reported that they have sleeping disorder since the job shit moves from
day to night and from night to day they cannot take proper rest. Though a few hours
are left for sleeping they find it difficult to sleep. Work place stress is costly and
becoming more so. It has many causes and these involve complex combinations of
physical, social, and psychological elements.

Emily Andrews (2010) revealed that nine in ten women workers have
experienced gender discrimination in the work place which includes offensive sexist
remarks and 90 percent of working women were subjected to gender harassment
which includes offensive remarks about being female, their appearance, body or
sexual activity. This behaviour leads to distress among the working women that fared
poorly at work as well as more likely to develop health problems that affect the
performance of working women and creates hostile environment that disadvantages
the working women.

Margaret Hodgins (2013) revealed that the study was done based on the
objectives to explore patterns of work place mistreatment; relationships with health
and with selected work place, economic and social factors responsible for the

69
mistreatment in the work place. The result of this study indicates that mistreatment
increases the risk of both physical and mental ill health and is associated with a range
of work environment factors. Overall 14.4% of the respondents have experienced at
least one adverse event of sexual harassment that is physical violence, verbal abuse,
bullying/harassment or threats and humiliating behavior in their work place. The
study states that 10.8% of the respondents felt that verbal abuse was most commonly
followed by threats/humiliation and bullying at 5% and 4.2% respectively. Physical
violence at work place was experienced by less than 2% of the population. The study
states that the female respondents were slightly but significantly more likely to
experience mistreatment in the form of bullying and harassment. The respondents
who experienced this mistreatment were more likely to report physical and mental
health problems such as headache; insomnia and injuries were about twice as likely
for those experiencing mistreatment. Those respondents who faces the mistreatment
suffers from the problems of anxiety/depression were three-four times more likely
faces the health problem. Those respondents who were ill-treated were also more
likely to be sick from work and work while sick, with the risk of presenteeism being
greater than absenteeism. Therefore, the study concludes that mistreatment in work
place is complex and interventions are required at the level of the organization.
Implementation issues are needed to be addressed as specific- anti bullying legislation
but this legislation does not appear to provide sufficient protection. Hence it is the
organizations responsibility to look after these misbehaviour activities in order to
reduce the harassment for women at work place.

Lal Bahadur Kunwar (2014) reveals that working women were offended by
all form of sexual harassment such as verbal (56.3) percent, physical (16.9) percent,
written or graphical (11.3) percent, gesture (8.5) percent and emotional (7.0) percent.
Hence the author states that 77.2 percent of women in the work place are subjected to
sexual harassment and the cause of harassment were power and position of male and
lack of awareness training among women. The study further reveals that the major
harassers to the women are the co-workers, immediate supervisor and manager. This
negatively impacts their performance in the work, their dignity and right.

Rebecca S Merkin , Muhammad Kamal Shah (2014) has carried out a

research to compare and contrast how differences in perceptions of sexual harassment

70
impact productive environments for employees and how it affects job satisfaction,
turn over and absenteeism. The result of this study indicated that the hurdle of work
place sexual harassment impacts on productive work environment even though the
work place environments are culturally distinct. The effect of sexual harassment has
increased the likelihood employees would have greater overall turnover intentions,
overall absenteeism and job dissatisfaction due to sexual harassment in the work
place. Further study states that respondents who are experiencing versus not
experiencing sexual harassment have great turnover intentions. While sexual
harassment leads to turnover intentions. The findings of this study further reveal that
education was a more important predictor of absenteeism. Employees with higher
education are more likely to respond to sexual harassment with absenteeism. Hence
the study conducted among Pakistan and US concludes that Pakistan as a developing
country maintains a viable work force. However, the effects of sexual harassment
results in negative work outcomes; where the US takes a direct and legal approach to
the problem of sexual harassment. In Pakistan the data reveals that more indirect
response to sexual harassment is preferred. Hence the study states that the increased
awareness from intercultural sexual harassment research would help guide and
encourage multinational corporations to apply sexual harassment policies
appropriately across different cultures.

Makaita Margret et.all (2015) has done a research study with the aim to assess
the effects of sexual harassment on employee performance. The study was carried out
among 205 employees in a stratified random sampling procedure. This study came out
with the findings that sexual harassment resulted in hostile working environment,
absenteeism; intention to leave, depression, work related stress and compromised
employee performance. The majority 70% of the respondents have agreed and
strongly agreed that sexual harassment is an unacceptable advances or request of
sexual favours while 20% of the respondents thought otherwise. Overwhelmingly
71% of the respondents have agreed on the statement that verbal harassment is the
major type of sexual harassment and with that 40% of the respondents have strongly
agreed to the same statement. Therefore, the research findings state that sexual
harassment has impacted positively on the employee performance as decreased job
performance and high labour turnover.

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 Idris Haruna et.all (2016) has done a research study with the objective to
analyse the causes and effects of sexual harassment on the performance of female
employees. This paper indicates that women at the lower cadre are mostly harassed
and it affects their performance in the organization. The results of this study show that
72% of the junior staff experienced the problem of harassment. Sexual harassment
was offensive to the victims with representing 50%. The major causes for the sexual
harassment were poor organizational mechanism in which 68% of the respondents
were prone to harassment at work place. The findings of the study further states that
the effects of such harassment include low employee morale, psychological threat,
loss of organizational and employee goodwill, out of these effects the major effect is
low employee productivity which hampers the growth of the organization.

2.5 COPING MECHANISMS ADOPTED BY THE VICTIMS TOWARDS

VICTIMIZATION
Newman et. all (2007)stated that the study had been done with the sample of
297 health workers in random, of whom 205 were women and 92 were men.
Researcher used a utilization-focused approach and administered health worker
survey, facility audits, key informant and health facility manager interviews and focus
groups to collect data. Study findings disclose that Thirty-nine percent of health
workers had experienced some form of workplace violence and workers‟ disclosure of
incidents varied with the type of violence. In most cases–especially those of verbal
abuse, bullying, and physical violence– victim disclosed the incident to colleagues,
friends and family. However, 40% of the victim did not disclose the occurrence to
anyone whereas 20% of victims of most forms of violence reported the incident to
their supervisor. The study also identified that as a result of sexual harassment most of
the female workers appeared to leave a job because of bullying and sexual harassment
experienced at work. In light of results from studies on violence against women it has
also been found that the prevalence of sexual harassment is due to culture of silence,
resignation and nondisclosure of sexual harassment by women.

Uma Devi.T (2011)stated that her study throws light on the wide spread
silence problem that is named as “stress” which gave raise to acute dysfunctions and
sexual harassments in the work place. The study states that the work stress is found in
all professions. IT professionals are very stressed because of the reason that they are

72
highly target driven and highly pressured on results. The focus of this paper was to
study the stress level among IT employees and to suggest the coping strategies. This
survey was done among 200 IT employees in the IT Companies situated in and
around Hyderabad. This study identified some of the stress coping strategy and this
includes stress management programs that creates awareness about stress and makes
employees to learn stress management techniques, physical activities planned in job
design through this the body can release stress, better through physical exertion and
indulging in any kind of physical activity while job design, life style modification
programs, supportive organization culture, stress counselling programs and spiritual
programs. Thus, the author concludes that stress issue had become contemporary,
being an occupational hazard in fast pacing IT profession need to be addressed
without delay. Hence the importance of the study of stress at various levels among IT
employees was growing. At organizational level well, designed coping strategies have
become the attention of companies like Tata Consultancy services, Infosys, Wipro,
Microsoft and Cognizant the author further stated in this study that stress can make an
individual productive and conservative when it is identified and well managed. In
times of great stress, the author states that it is always best to keep busy, to avoid
anger and spend energy into something positive. Positive attitude and meditation are
the best way for the coping of stress in the work place.

Chesfeeda Akhtar (2013) conducted a case study through both the quantitative
as well as the qualitative methods by canvassing interview schedules, carrying out
focus group discussions and observation with the objective to analyse the magnitude
and nature of sexual harassment and women‟s responses to this type of violence. The
result of this study indicated that sexual harassment is rampant but most of the women
in the work place do not come forward to report the problem and in such cases the
problem goes underreporting. From the observation and informal group discussions it
had been concluded that, none of the abused women had informed their family
members about the incidents of sexual harassment suffered by them. The reasons, as
reported by them, were, that primarily it would have been embarrassing to discuss
such matters with their family members and moreover it would have only aggravated
their problem by troubling their family members who in distress might have asked
them to leave the job or there was some apprehension that they might have found
faults with their behaviour to have “invited” the abuse. So they found it safest to hide

73
their sufferings while employing strategies to prevent any untoward incident and
endured rest of it as the price for economic survival. It had been found that none of
the abused women had ever taken any action against the offender neither had they told
anybody that they were being subjected to sexual harassment. The strategy that all the
abused women employed was to avoid the harasser and if not possible then to ignore
and deflect the harassment by joking while preventing/and escaping any untoward
incident. There were many reasons for the abused women‟s reluctance to take any
action against the offenders and for never reporting their victimisation to anybody
which primarily included fear of embarrassment and of being stigmatized, fear of
reprisal which might worsen the situation and make the environment more hostile and
because of it, fear of losing the job or otherwise hurting their careers which they could
not afford keeping in view the importance of economic independence.

Essien, Blessing Stephen(2014) examined different form of coping strategies

adopted by female employees of commercial banks. The cross- sectional descriptive
survey design was adopted and various coping strategies as they influence
occupational stress were examined. Occupational stress and coping strategy
questionnaire was used in data collection. This study found that to cope with
workplace stress female employees have adopted various strategies. This study found
that organizational coping strategies such as job rotation and annual leave have a
reducing effect on occupational stress but lunch breaks does not. On the other hand,
the study found that female employees in banks adopted personal coping techniques
such as colleagues assistance, muscle relaxation exercise example walking around
when stressed, drinking much water, watching television, listening to music, chatting
with colleagues, and laughter in dealing with occupational stress. The study
concludes that although these personal strategies have been used differently by
employees in dealing with their stress problems, some of them have been found to
have insignificant moderating effect on occupational stress.

Mariam Ciby and R P Raya (2014)stated that the objective of the study was to
explore the victim‟s experiences from an interpretive perspective in the context of IT
Sector in India. In this study the qualitative data were collected through in-depth
interview with the victims of work place bullying. The study indicates that the major
antecedents of work place bullying were job demands, leadership and management

74
styles of the supervisors and interpersonal conflict that leads to work place bullying. It
had been found that the victim‟s inability to adapt to changes was found to be a
personality factor which stimulates work place bullying. To reduce this effect of work
place bullying the victims used self-coping mechanism. The self-coping mechanisms
were observed to have a subsequent effect on the consequences of the victims. The
most frequent self-coping method used by the victims was sharing their emotional
experiences with their friends and family members. In the current study one of the
victim who were reluctant to share his experiences with friends and family had
reported intense negative effects such as sleep disturbance. In this study it was stated
that another form of coping mechanism adopted by the victims were easy going
attitudes. It has been observed that the victims with easy going attitudes had taken the
situations lightly and thus survived the consequences of bullying. Another important
self-coping mechanism was voicing the issues with higher officials such as
supervisors or skip-level managers or HR managers. In this study it was revealed that
out of twelve victims nine of them voiced their concerns to higher officials. Most of
the victims reported that they had reservations in approaching Human Resource (HR)
Professionals because the complaints would directly seem to be reported to the
supervisors. This would only worsen the relationship with the supervisor where the
supervisor himself would be a bully. In most cases it was observed that the victims
voicing was found ineffective as it did not help in getting any assistance to solve to
the issue. Some of the targets were stamped as troublemakers and reasons behind the
bullying issues. The victims perceived such responses as unfair and unsupportive.
Therefore, the study concludes that even though the IT employees dedicate their lives
and worked hard for the success of the project, they realized that the organization did
not value their contribution. The commitment levels of the victims went down and
this might have also contributed to their high turnover intentions. Hence even though
the IT industry has a global work environment the employees were unaware and
unfamiliar about the phenomenon. Even though the phenomenon and its effect existed
most of the respondents have considered the negative bullying behaviour as part of
their work culture. Therefore, organization should organize awareness programmes on
work place harassment and coping mechanism methods to enable the employees to
effectively manage such situations.

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 Balaji (2014) has stated in his research article that managing work related
problems and stress in employees and role of an HR manager are intrinsically
correlated. The study declares that in present scenario insufficient priority has been
given to the work organization. The author insist that the first step in helping
employee is to find out what is causing the most stress and what an employee‟s idea
of a stress free environment would be. If the employees are not comfortable in talking
to the manager the manager should make arrangements for the employees to speak to
someone else. The author further states as the better way for coping in the work place
as the managers can decrease stress by setting clear expectations, helping employees
prioritize, being available to listen to employee concerns and not tolerating any work
place bullying or harassing. Hence organization should encourage stress relief by
providing a safe and pleasant work place, a relaxing break room in which to eat, a
nutritious selection of food at the cafeteria, access to a gym and resources to reduce
stress for employees.

Zhilarasi (2015) revealed that employees have adopted various coping

strategies to cope up with the problem in the work place. Employees tend to cope by
using submissive coping, functional coping, relaxation coping, third party support
coping, cognitive restructuring coping and transitory reinforcement coping in the
work place. It had been found that 28% of the respondents used the complaint, 30% of
the respondents sometimes used to write stress dairy as the mechanism to cope up the
problem in the work place.30% of the respondents have reported that they sleep more,
38% of the respondents highly used to sets the goals daily and prioritize the work,
42% of the respondents used to use entertainment source like listening to music and
they are engaged in hobbies like reading and painting. The study states that most of
the respondents were highly involved in meditation or yoga, physical exercise as a
main coping strategy to reduce stress in the work place. Some of the respondents have
got professional help from their peer group, 38% of the employees are sometimes tries
to look things differently, highly talk with friends to leave the tension at work.

Rajalakshmi(2015) has stated that 33% of the respondents have felt more work
place bullying. 34% of the respondents have said that the work place bullying was
more prevalent in the age group below 25 years. 42.4% of the respondent‟s opinion
was they were criticized in their work place. Most of the respondents felt that their

76
performance was affected due to the sexual harassment and 46.2% of the respondents
have felt that they were treated differently by their colleagues in the work place.
29.5% of the respondents have reported that their responsibility increases as well as
their authority was removed. Most of the respondents felt that the verbal threats had
taken place in their work place where 32.9% of the respondents agreed with the
influences of work place bullying towards employee stress. 36.7% of the respondents
have felt over pressure to meet the expectations. Most of the respondents have said
that listening to music are measures that they adopted to overcome the stress and the
problems that they experienced in the work place. Most of the respondents preferred
increasing in staff turnover as the factors that based on employee stress. 43.8% of the
women have felt that productivity increases due to the control of work place bullying
in the organization. 32.8% of the respondents preferred proper orientation procedure
has the only way to overcome the employee stress in their work place. Hence the
study states that by taking proper measures against the work place bullying there is a
wide opportunity to develop the welfare of the employees and to improve the
harmony among the employees which in turn will increase the performance level of
the employees.

Jaswant Deora(2016) has stated in the article “sexual harassment at work

place” that the increasing numbers of women have joined the work force and this
outsized number has increased the vulnerability of unwanted attention at the work
place. The study reveals that majority of the women have faced sexual harassment at
some point of time in their office or in the way to work. Women who experienced this
violence were forced to keep silence because if they make a noise about the problem
then they are subjected to worse crime like assault grievous, indecent, rape and acid
attack. The author suggests that the work place harassment has increased day by day
and law should be made strict enough and should be strictly applied. The victim or
aggrieved persons has to come to court without hesitation of any kind. It has also been
suggested that the women should be able to work in a secure as well as good
environment. Their dignity should be maintained and should not be harassed by any
act of any person. Apart from this the author states that the legislation alone cannot
provide the mindset to understand the fears, compulsions, and pressures on women
victims. The legal concept and test of a “reasonable man” should give right of gender

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to that of a “reasonable women as well”; if this had been followed then the problem of
sexual harassment can be reduced to some extent for women in the work place.

Lekha Laxman (2014)Revealed that the results of the study on unofficial

action taken by the respondents show that majority of the victims of sexual
harassment chose to handle the unwelcome sex/gender related attention personally by
totally avoiding the person(s) (79.0%). Significant number of them also requested the
person to stop the behaviour (64.8%) or alternatively ignored the behaviour (63.1%).
Approximately half of the respondents choose to involve third party either by
requesting someone else to handle the problem on their behalf (52.4%) or getting
unofficially advice from them (45.9%). Meanwhile 43.5% of the respondents choose
to act as though the unwelcome sex offences did not bother them. Slightly more than a
third of the respondents had threaten to tell or told co-workers about the incidents
(37.4%) or requested a transfer elsewhere (37.1%) or alternatively requested advice
from other departments (35.5%). Almost one third of the respondents (33.9%) had
requested additional training for the person(s‟) work center/unit. Most of the
respondents (74.2%) choose not to rely on outside help such as hotline for advice or
information.

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