Forced to Resign After Harassment Complaint: Can I Seek Compensation or Legal Action?

I put a harassment complaint in the company against some employees. Instead of taking action against them, the company forced me to resign in February 2020. The company gave me one month of extra pay. I had a 6-year work period there.

Compensation and Legal Action

I want to ask how much money the company was liable to pay me. Also, can I take any action against the company?

Gratuity and Leave Encashment

What about gratuity? Has the company paid gratuity to you? What about leave encashment? Was there un-availed leave? Did your company give you the "Full and Final Settlement Sheet" (FFS)? Please check the payable attributes mentioned in the sheet.

If you have rendered six years of continuous service, then you are eligible to get the gratuity. If the company has not paid gratuity to you, then submit Form 1 under the provisions of the Payment of Gratuity Act of your state to the company. When you submit the form, prepare two copies of the form. Submit one copy and take a signature on the second copy from the HR Department. For your records, you need to have your own copy also.

Thanks,
Dinesh Divekar

Dear ANONYMOUS Friend,

Kindly provide the following details:

- What kind of harassment complaint did you make?
- What is your gender?
- How many employees are working in your company?
- What deductions from your salary were made by your company?

You tendered your resignation in the month of February 2020. After 6 months, you say it was forcibly taken by your company. You cannot do anything now for your resignation taken forcibly by your company. Do you have any evidence that the resignation was taken forcibly?

If you are a female and the harassment complaint you lodged is supported by proof, you can probably initiate action against your company, regardless of the number of employees it has.

The Gratuity Act is applicable to your company if your company has or had at any time in the past 10 or more employees.

You should receive salary in lieu of any leave that you have not availed.

I hope this helps. Let me know if you need any further assistance.

Required details are as follows:

1) I am male.

2) The company is a multinational company with thousands of employees.

3) I resigned in February 2020, with a three-month notice period, which I served. Thus, my last working day was in May 2020.

4) I could not take action earlier because of the coronavirus lockdown.

5) The company paid me all gratuity and provided a full and final settlement sheet.

The harassment complaint is as follows:

Due to some ongoing personnel problems, I became stressed and somewhat mentally disturbed during those days. Some employees began making videos of me and mocking me. They would openly and loudly call me "PAGAL" (insane). I lodged a complaint with HR. Then they started commenting on my religion and even threatened to beat me outside the company. When I complained, many more employees joined in and harassed me openly on a mass scale. Nearly the whole department was involved. When I took this to HR, they forced me to resign instead of taking action against them, claiming I was not medically fit and my complaint was not valid.

HR assured me they would take me back into the company after medical treatment, but for now, I had to resign. They also assured me that I could retract my resignation later within the notice period. I initially refused to resign, but they insisted and assured me they would reinstate me, so I resigned.

My company has a portal for resignations where employees can retract their resignation within the notice period. I attempted to do so, but my company blocked my accounts even before my tenure expired. I sent several emails from an external email regarding my complaint and the account blocking, but they did not respond. Ultimately, my last working day arrived, and they provided a full and final settlement after some time.

They paid me gratuity and one month's extra pay.

Thanks

Dear aggrieved member,

On reading your post, one can conclude that you have been discharged after receiving your legitimate dues. Therefore, there seems to be no problem as such. You should have approached this forum when your harassment was ongoing. It is too late now. Anyway, paragraph-wise replies to your post are as below:

The harassment complaint is as follows:

Due to some ongoing personnel problems, I became very stressed and was somewhat mentally disturbed during those days. Some employees of the company began making videos of me for fun. They used to call me PAGAL (insane) openly and loudly. I filed a complaint with HR. Then they started commenting on my religion. They would openly threaten to beat me outside the company. When I complained against them, many more employees joined in and began harassing me openly on a mass scale. Nearly the whole department was involved in this. When I took this to HR, they forced me to resign instead of taking any action, saying that I was not medically fit and my complaint was not valid.

Reply: What happened to you is not just unfortunate but outrageous too. If the whole department started making fun, then before complaining to HR, did you complain to the HOD? What was his/her view?

When you reported the matter to HR, instead of showing empathy, why did HR take the extreme decision of forcing you to resign? If HR started pressuring you to resign, why did you not escalate the matter? Why did you not put an application to the MD of the company?

HR actually told me that they would take me back into the company after medical treatment, but for now, I had to resign. They also assured me that I could withdraw my resignation later within the notice period. I refused to resign, but they forced me and assured me they would take me back, so I resigned.

Reply: It was probably well decided by the senior authorities to check you out of the company. Therefore, HR gave a false assurance on your reinstatement. In fact, if HR were to tell you to withdraw your resignation, there was no point in accepting it. HR has just hoodwinked you. Anyway, most HR departments just execute what their bosses say; therefore, they use these tactics to mislead the employee to attain their goal.

My company has a portal for resignations where employees can withdraw their resignation even after some time if done within the notice period. I did the same. I tried to withdraw my resignation on that portal within the notice period, but my company blocked my company accounts even before my tenure expired. I sent several emails from an external account regarding my complaint and the account blocking, but they did not reply. Ultimately, my last working day came, and they gave me a full and final settlement after some time.

Reply: This is further evidence of how you had become persona non grata in your company. They wanted to remove you anyway. They just bought time to give a semblance of normalcy.

Final Comments: The above comments are based on listening to your side only. Generally, forums like this are expected to be neutral, and we should give our comments after listening to both sides. Nevertheless, nobody can undo the past, and you are no exception. Everyone passes through rough patches in life. Take this as a rough patch and move on. If you have not yet secured a new job, start searching vigorously. Spend some time introspecting and identifying where you went wrong. Life is much longer, and many successes could be waiting for you.

All the best!

Dinesh Divekar