Company manager demands physical favour from woman to clear her dead father’s provident fund; booked by police

The complainant woman’s father worked for a Mazgaon-based company from 2009 to 2015. He died in 2015 when the complainant woman was 15 years old. His father’s employee was deducting EPF from her father’s salary. After his demise, she was to get the balance of the EPF after attaining the age of 18, as her father named her as the nominee, the police said.

On turning 18, the woman approached the EPF office in Bandra and filled out a form to claim her father’s EPF money. She followed up with the EPF office for nearly five years but had not gotten her dues.

The FIR states that in February 2023, the EPF officials informed her that her father’s EPF file had been sent to his employer’s manager, called ‘Sushant sir’, and that she would get the EPF in 45 days. But, as she did not get the dues, she contacted the person named Sushant about releasing the EPF.

“Sushant sir told me that he would help me get my father’s EPF and demanded physical favours from me via text messages. I ignored it. But this year, in February, when she followed up the matter again, he again sent such obscene messages demanding physical relationships,” the woman stated in the FIR.

A source said the woman then approached the Kherwadi police station and filed a complaint with screenshots of “Sushant sir’s” vulgar conversation.

The police registered a case against the accused under Section 509B (sexual harassment by electronic mode) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 67A (transmitting of material containing sexually explicit acts, etc., in electronic form) of the Information Technology Act. They are looking for him.