POSH Complaint Across Organisations: Which IC Decides

If the person who harassed you does not work for your employer, you still file your POSH complaint with the Internal Committee at your own workplace. You do not have to chase the Internal Committee of the harasser's office, and neither committee can send you away just because he works elsewhere. The Supreme Court settled this on 10 December 2025.

This page answers one narrow question: when the respondent belongs to a different department, company or profession, which Internal Committee (IC) must take your complaint? It does not re-explain how to file from scratch, or how to appeal. For those, see the two guides linked at the end.

Follow the branch that matches your situation. The governing law throughout is the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 (the POSH Act).

Branch 1 - The respondent works for the same employer as you. Simple case. Your employer's own Internal Committee hears it. Under Section 4(1) of the POSH Act, “Every employer of a workplace shall, by an order in writing, constitute a Committee to be known as the Internal Complaints Committee”. That committee covers everyone your employer employs, including you and the respondent.

Branch 2 - You are an employee, but the respondent works elsewhere. This is the situation that used to get people bounced around: the respondent is a client, a contractor, a visiting doctor, a person from a partner company, or an officer of a different government department. The answer is now clear. You file with the Internal Committee of your own workplace. The committee where you work runs the inquiry. It does not matter that the respondent draws his salary somewhere else. See the section below on what the Supreme Court decided.

Branch 3 - The respondent has no real employer relationship at all. Same answer as Branch 2. If you are an employee, your starting point is always the Internal Committee at your own workplace. Whether the respondent is self-employed, a freelancer, or a member of the public who was on your premises, your committee is the one that receives and inquires into the complaint.

Branch 4 - You are not an employee anywhere. The POSH Act protects any woman at a workplace, not only staff on the rolls. If you were harassed as a client, patient, student, intern or visitor and you have no committee of your own, you approach the Internal Committee of the workplace where the incident happened. If that establishment has no Internal Committee - for example it has fewer than ten workers - or your complaint is against the employer himself, the Local Committee of the district receives it under Section 6 of the POSH Act.

One clock applies to every branch. Section 9(1) says an aggrieved woman may make her complaint in writing “within a period of three months from the date of incident and in case of a series of incidents, within a period of three months from the date of last incident”. A committee can extend this on recorded reasons, but do not gamble on it. File early.

For years, some Internal Committees refused cross-organisation complaints. They read the words “where the respondent is an employee” in the POSH machinery as if those words limited each committee to complaints against its own staff. So a woman harassed by an outsider was told, in effect, “he is not our employee, go to his committee” - and his committee told her “you are not our employee, go to yours”.

The Supreme Court closed that gap in Dr Sohail Malik v. Union of India, 2025 INSC 1415, decided on 10 December 2025 (Civil Appeal No. 404 of 2024, judgment authored by J.K. Maheshwari J.). The Court framed the exact problem this way:

“The jurisdictional challenge by the Appellant in the present case, inter alia relates to whether the Internal Complaints Committee (hereinafter referred to as ICC) constituted at a certain Department of the Government of India can entertain a complaint under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 (hereinafter referred to as POSH Act) against the Appellant who was working at a different Department of the Government of India at the relevant time.”

And it answered:

“Use of the phrase 'where the respondent is an employee' is essentially a procedural trigger, directing the ICC to apply the service rules which are applicable to the respondent, it is not a jurisdictional constraint limiting a particular ICC to hear the complaint.”

In plain words: those words tell the committee which service rules to apply when it comes to punishment. They do not decide which committee can hear you. The committee at the aggrieved woman's own workplace can inquire into a complaint even when the respondent works in a different department or organisation.

A refusal after this judgment is not a lawful reason, it is a mistake to be corrected. Here is a calm, on-paper way to fix it.

1. Get the refusal in writing. Ask the committee to record its reason for not accepting your complaint. If they will not put it on paper, send your complaint by email or registered post so there is a dated record that you filed it.
2. Point them to the ruling. In one short line, state that under Dr Sohail Malik v. Union of India, 2025 INSC 1415, the phrase “where the respondent is an employee” is not a jurisdictional bar, so the Internal Committee at your own workplace must inquire. You do not need to argue the whole case, just cite it.
3. Escalate to the employer. The employer constituted the committee under Section 4(1) and is responsible for it functioning. Write to the head of your organisation asking them to direct the committee to register and inquire into your complaint.

The RTI route - only where your workplace is a public authority. If your own employer is a government department, a public sector undertaking, a government hospital, a university or any body funded or controlled by the government, it is a “public authority” under the RTI Act, 2005, and you can use an RTI to put facts on record. Frame your application as questions, for example:

1. A copy of the written order constituting the Internal Committee, with the names and designations of its members (the order that Section 4(1) requires).
2. A copy of the Internal Committee's most recent annual report. Section 21 of the POSH Act requires that “The Internal Committee or the Local Committee, as the case may be, shall in each calendar year prepare an annual report and submit the same to the employer and the District Officer”.
3. The written procedure the committee follows when a complaint names a person who is not on the employer's rolls.

These answers show whether a committee even exists and is functioning, and they make it much harder for anyone to keep stalling. Note the limit: RTI reaches only public authorities. If you work for a private company, you cannot RTI its Internal Committee papers. In that case, if the committee will not act, take your complaint to the Local Committee of the district and to the District Officer, who receives every committee's annual report under Section 21 and can be told that a committee is not doing its job.

For a fuller playbook on using information law to unstick a stuck process, see The RTI Playbook.

The Internal Committee at your own workplace. Because you are an employee, your employer's committee is your starting point. It does not matter that the client is on someone else's payroll. The Supreme Court in Dr Sohail Malik v. Union of India held that the respondent working elsewhere is not a jurisdictional bar to your committee hearing the complaint.

Tell them, in writing: under Dr Sohail Malik v. Union of India, 2025 INSC 1415, the phrase “where the respondent is an employee” is a procedural trigger for service rules, not a limit on which Internal Committee can hear the complaint, so the committee at my own workplace must inquire. Keep a dated copy of your complaint and their reply.

The POSH Act protects women at a workplace even if they are not staff. Approach the Internal Committee of the workplace where it happened. If that place has no committee, or if your complaint is against the employer himself, the Local Committee of the district takes it under Section 6 of the POSH Act.

Section 9(1) sets a normal limit of three months from the incident, or three months from the last incident in a series. A committee may extend this if you show good reasons, recorded in writing, but that is not guaranteed. File as soon as you can rather than relying on an extension.

Yes, if the workplace is a public authority such as a government office, PSU or government hospital. You can ask for the written order that constituted the Internal Committee under Section 4(1) and its latest annual report under Section 21. RTI does not reach a private company, so for a private employer use the Local Committee and District Officer route instead.

1. New to this and need the full filing process? Read how to file a POSH workplace harassment complaint, which walks through drafting the complaint, evidence and the inquiry step by step.
2. Already have a finding you disagree with? Read how to appeal a POSH Internal Committee finding under Section 18, which covers the appeal window and forum.
3. Draft your RTI to a public-authority employer using the AI RTI Drafter, then track the reply with the RTI Timeline Tracker.

Source: Dr Sohail Malik v. Union of India, 2025 INSC 1415, Supreme Court of India, 10 December 2025 - read the judgment on Indian Kanoon.