South Mumbai institute gets emails against profs; case lodged

Police said that in the emails, the sender claimed that the professors were not interested in teaching and that they only come to talk to girls and female staffers.

According to police officials, the emails were received by the institute on July 12, 2023, and September 20 and 23, 2024.

The officials said that in the first email, received on July 12 last year, the sender posed as a female staff member of the college and claimed that a male professor calls and sends text messages to women staff at night. The sender requested the administration to install CCTV cameras for the safety of the women.

The officials from the institute did not take any cognisance of the email, as they believed it was a prank committed by someone. However, the principal and the college’s administration received another email at 11:32 am on September 20, where the sender posed as a first-year student of the college and claimed that the professors are not interested in teaching and that the quality of education has declined.

“The email also defamed a male professor of the institute and threatened to complain to Shiv Sena and call for a protest over such low quality of education,” an officer said.
Later, when the institute received another email on September 23, the principal and a male professor reported the matter to the police station, after which a case was registered under Section 79 (intentionally insulting a woman’s modesty) and Section 356(2) (defamation) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), as well as Section 67(A) of the IT Act.

“We have registered an offense, and in an attempt to trace the suspect. We have started scrutinizing the IP addresses of the email accounts from which the harassment emails were sent,” an investigator said.