4 Sexual Harassment and Sexual Harassment at Workplace

Two layers: 1. The general offence (the Code, by principle): harassment — the teasing, taunting, or misbehaviour of a sexual nature (the street/street-level offence: the chhoti harahar? — rather: the Code's sexual-harassment provision punishing sexual gestures, comments, or conduct against a person's modesty/will) — the public-space harassment criminalized; 2. The workplace statute — the Sexual Harassment at Workplace (Prevention) Act, 2071 (2015): the dedicated code: - Definition (the Act's heads): verbal, physical, or gestural conduct of sexual nature; showing/exhibiting sexual content; expressing sexual intentions towards the co-worker/service-user — unwelcome conduct the key; - The machinery: the complaint committee mandatory in workplaces above the statutory employee-threshold (the internal committee's inquiry, its timelines, the confidentiality duty); complaints beyond/against the committee's disposal to the authority; the Code of Conduct requirement (the Act's preventive core: every workplace's sexual-harassment code, displayed and enforced); - The remedies/penalties: apology-through-to-criminal referral; the employer's duty (the investigation, the transfer protections, the non-retaliation); - The critique (the practice note): the committee's capture-risk (the employer-appointed committee judging the employer), the informal-sector's exclusion (the Act reaching only the formal workplace — the majority of working women outside), the under-reporting culture — the #MeToo-era Nepali debates' legal map.