Right now, there's somebody wondering if she should complain. Right now, there's also some CEO who's unbothered by 'sexual harassment'.

Why worry? Why, because it could happen to you.

Yes, you, the decision-maker. No matter how noble your company's image, you can't ignore the issue any longer. If an allegation can hurt a company as halo-sporting as Infosys, it can do more damage to your business than you may have reckoned.

Needless to say, sexual harassment is against the law. And if US trends are anything to go by, the employer is to be held responsible, regardless of whether the company has any clue of what is going on.

Remember that sexual harassment cases bear less of a correlation with actual workplace occurrence, than with the victims' confidence in justice. In other words, the courage to speak up is the chief constraint. A small trigger, and case after case could tumble out.

In the US, the trigger has been a clear definition of the offence: "Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favours, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature constitutes 'sexual harassment' when submission to or rejection of this conduct explicitly or implicitly affects an individual's employment, unreasonably interferes with an individual's work performance or creates an intimidating, hostile or offensive work environment."

At one time, US courts used to make a distinction between a 'quid pro quo' offence, involving a do-this-or-else threat, and a 'work environment' offence, covering any sexual conduct in the workplace that would offend any 'reasonable person'. Of late, however, the courts have starting taking everything equally seriously. The operative word is 'unwelcome'. Butt-brushes, finger-motions, porn-flashes, profanity-utterances... 'bottomline' jokes-these can now prove as incriminating as the unprintable perversions of a boss exploiting an underling with kids to feed on her salary.

The law in India? 'Eve-teasing' is treated rather lightly, and the IPC's Section 354 ('outraging female modesty'), is better suited to roadside rogues than corporate predators. The 1997 'Vishaka Vs Rajasthan' case did set a precedent aligning Indian law with global practice, but it has been a weak deterrent.

Does Indian law need to get tougher? Perhaps. But only so long as it doesn't end up boosting the likelihood of 'false-guilty' errors, given the increasing misuse of sexual charges as defamatory weapons.

What's more, perceptions of 'sexual conduct' tend to vary across cultures. Eating lunch with one's fingers, for example, could be a job hazard in an American cafeteria. The word 'stuff' could book you in the UK.

That doesn't mean that everybody has to be uptight about every little thing. Offices are full of people, and people tend to socialise, with all its consequences. Co-worker relationships are not illegal, and companies that meddle with employees' freedom stand to lose their best brains. But even here; who's to stop an embittered ex from getting vindictive?

Your best bet is to arm yourself, legally. First and foremost, issue a clear sexual harassment policy that's not merely consistent with, say, US law, but worded strongly enough to deter any misconduct that could jeopardise the interests of your company. Second, institute a freely-accessible complaint system that serves as a credible means of grievance redressal.

A court case could actually hinge on the credibility of this system, since guilt often boils down to whether the 'unwelcome' nature of the conduct was communicated clearly (and swiftly) to the accused, or to anyone else in authority (if the fear factor is strong).

Here again, misunderstandings are common because social norms vary. Romantic pursuit in Hindi cinema, for instance, tends to portray initial rejection as a future 'consent' contract. To an American, this is just as bewildering as an Indian bobbing his head diagonally-part-nod, part-shake-in response to a yes/no question.

Ambiguity won't do: No means No!