No sexual offence cases against Navy officers: Admiral DK Joshi

Notwithstanding allegations of wife swapping against its officers, the Navy today said there were no cases of "sexual offence" against its personnel and it follows "zero tolerance" in such matters. "There has been no case of sexual offence. There have been five to six cases which have come to our notice in the last five to six years and they were unacceptable for us and in all the cases, our monitoring and vigilance mechanism detected these cases," Navy Chief Admiral DK Joshi said at the annual Navy Day press conference here.

He was asked about cases of sexual offences against the Naval officers and the steps taken by the force for gender sensitisation.

The Navy Chief said the force has given "harshest" of punishments including dismissal to its officers found guilty. "We speedily processed them and we have meted out harshest punishments in these cases including dismissals. The media came to know about them in last stage. We have zero tolerance in these cases," he said.

In the recent times, the officers of the force have faced serious allegations of sexual misconduct including that of wife swapping by the wife of a Navy Commander. Another Navy officer's wife based in Karwar had charged her husband with "forcing her to consume alcohol and getting sexually involved" with his colleagues prompting Defence Minister AK Antony to order an inquiry. Another Navy officer was sacked for lewd messages to multiple women using several sim cards while another is facing sacking for having illicit affairs after his marriage.

A Commodore-rank officer was sacked for having illicit affair with a Russian woman during his posting in Russia to oversee the retrofitting of INS Vikramaditya there. Apparently upset over such incidents, the Defence Minister had told the naval commanders' conference recently that there have been some isolated cases which have proved to be a cause for serious concern and embarrassment.