Dhanbad, March 14: An IAF officer was found responsible for misbehaving with a lady passenger on board the New Delhi-Bhubaneswar Rajdhani Express in December last year.

A written complaint was lodged against three jawans of the IAF’s Kalaikunda airbase — in Bengal’s West Midnapore district — by the 22-year-old student with Gomoh GRP station on December 27.

Following their arrest and release on bail on December 28, a “formal investigation” by the airbase in January blamed one of the jawans for “improper behaviour” and “all three have been blamed for not reporting the matter to IAF authorities in time about the said incident”, said defence minister A.K. Antony in a written reply to Rajya Sabha MPs Harish Rawat and Santosh Bagrodia on Wednesday. A case against all the three was registered under section 354/34 IPC and is still being investigated by GRP Gomoh.

The statement also added that the next hearing of the case is on April 3 in the court of the judicial magistrate of railway, Dhanbad, and if their guilt is established followed by a conviction by the criminal court, further appropriate action would be taken under the Air Force Laws against them.

The Cuttack-based woman, a third-year student of Ravenshaw University, had levelled charges of eve-teasing in her FIR with the Gomoh GRP against IAF technical officer Indrajit Nath, IAF sergeants T. Mukherjee and R. Biswas.

The woman and her mother were travelling with the airmen in an AC 3-tier coach (AS III) on the 2444 Bhubaneswar Rajdhani Express.

One of the three, allegedly the prime accused, Indrajit Nath was on the upper berth while the woman was in the middle. Late in the night, when lights were off, she could feel a hand on her, which was allegedly of Nath’s as he was caught immediately. The other two with him opposed the charge and allegedly misbehaved with her mother too.