Charges framed against RK Pachauri in sexual harassment case, trial from January 4

NEW DELHI: A Delhi court on Saturday framed charges of sexual harassment against noted environmentalist RK Pachauri. The Saket court in Delhi said that the case will go to trial and it will start recording evidence from January 4, 2019. Pachauri has sought a speedy trial in the case citing his old age. 

"I am 78-years-old, please expedite the matter," he told the court. Defence counsel Ashish Dixit said that Pachauri and his family were facing hardship due to the pendency. Pachauri has pleaded not guilty and claimed a trial.

Charges against him have been framed under section 354 (outraging modesty of a woman), 354A (sexual harassment) and section 509 (words used to outrage the modesty of a woman). 

The case pertains to allegations against Pachauri for harassing a woman colleague in 2015. 

In the last hearing, the court had dropped charges of criminal force against a woman, stalking and wrongful restraint that were levelled against the former chief of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) that the Delhi Police had booked him under.

Pachauri had to step down as Chairperson of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in February 2015 and quit TERI after the charges against him had been levelled. 

Pachauri has, however, denied all charges against him.