Daily Times

The two female owners, as they claimed, of this modest café in Islamabad, which by the bye, serves average food, mocked their manager in glaring public view for his English.  As they mocked Owais, they also filmed him and shared with the world their friendly “banter”. Their idea of fun did not quite get the reception, they thought it would. And so, they are “saddened” and “appalled” with the reaction of masses. Their apology certainly surpasses that of Socrates. The faux-pas of the desis has created quite a wave – thankfully taking our attention away from wailing Murad Saeed and his incoherent press conferences!

Gulliver Travels is instructive on so many life lessons. For instance, Jonathan Swift suggests, in the book, that vanity should be taxed. But this tax alone will not help the two women. For their inconsistent affected accents, they need to be sent to a finishing school – also perhaps to teach them some manners and a lesson or two on self-awareness. But no school can teach you how to kill boredom – you need to measure up, only to an extent, on intelligence quotient. But then Yuval Noah Harari would argue, that too depends, on the stage of evolution for homo rudolfensis, homo erectus, homo neanderthalensis and homo sapiens.

Is it harassment? Yes. Do we have a law that penalizes the actions of two desis as harassment? No. The only law to cater for the workplace harassment in Pakistan is The Protection against Harassment of Women at the Workplace Act, 2010 (there are other regimes under Pakistan Penal Code, 1860 and The Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, 2016 – but they are not relevant here). With time, we have learned that the restrictive scope of the protection needs to be reviewed. The title, to begin with, should remove reference to one gender only.

The definition of “harassment” should be broadened to include all kinds of harassment that make the workplace “hostile” or “offensive”, and should not be limited to such instances only that have a sexual undertone.  Under the Act, a complainant could be both woman and man. However, the law should clarify that a complainant does not need to be an employee at a workplace – and not leave it for the judges to plug the holes and legislate for the parliament.  It’s important to bring greater clarity on the issue of complainant. We have seen a lot of students facing issues of harassment in schools and universities but they are not employees at a workplace. And not every judge would take a liberal view of the complainant under the Act.

The definition of “harassment” should be broadened to include all kinds of harassment that make the workplace “hostile” or “offensive”, and should not be limited to such instances only that have a sexual undertone

The definition of “workplace”, therefore, too needs to be redrafted to liberalize its scope of application. Presently, the law notes the “workplace” means “a place of work” or “where an organization or employer operates”. The definition, at the very least, should clarify that it should be a place of work of organization or employer or any natural or juristic person but does not need to be a workplace of a complainant.

In addition, greater powers should be given to the Ombudsperson (and not “Ombudsman” as written in the law). While the Federal Ombudsmen Institutional Reforms Act, 2013 granted additional power to the Ombudsperson to issue temporary injunctions, but there is no express provision in the enabling law, that allows the Ombudsperson, to issue orders such as suspending the services of the accused till the final outcome of the decision or till conclusion of inquiry or power that allows, as major penalty, closure of business establishments in case of private parties. In addition to the fine, the Ombudsperson should be given the powers to impose (exemplary) damages on the accused as a greater punitive measure.

Unless we tighten our laws, and ensure our courts and tribunals deliver timely justice, we cannot hold ghastly folks, such as the two desis, to account. Owais knows that should he choose to enforce his rights, he would not get any relief from the office of Ombudsperson, labor courts, or civil courts of ordinary jurisdiction. So here we have a man, who reticently and knowingly, opts to be a clown, for the desis in authority, to ridicule. They can crush his ego, make a hash of his self-esteem and mention he is paid so well for being our clown –  and yet go away scot free. Oh, but they are “saddened” and “appalled” by the response from people. I hope they take counselling sessions for the mental turmoil they are going through at the moment. They need all the help they can get!

The writer attended Berkeley and is a Barrister of Lincoln’s Inn