Chandigarh, Jan.5 (PTI): A former woman IAS officer has demanded that the Padma Shri be taken back from former Punjab police chief K.P.S. Gill convicted of molesting her.

Rupan Deol Bajaj’s demand came a day after the government decided to strip S.P.S Rathore of his President’s medal for his conviction in the Ruchika Girhotra molestation case.

Gill, 74, who is credited with retrieving Punjab from insurgency, dismissed the demand as “nonsense”.

Rupan said she wanted the Centre to move against Gill in the same manner as it had proceeded against Rathore.

“Gill’s case is also one of moral turpitude. All his medals and the Padma Shri should be taken away,” she said.

“It is very necessary that some kind of message should go out to society that such persons do not deserve to have these high decorations (like the Padma Shri),” she said.

“I think Ruchika would not have been molested had K.P.S. Gill not been given the Padma Shri. Because (Rathore) knew that if such things happen even to IAS officers, they can get away, a top cop can get away with it,” she said.

Gill, who got the country’s fourth highest civilian honour in 1989, said retrospective punishment was “against the law”.

Gill also appeared to suggest that he was not unduly bothered if the medals given to him were taken away by the government. “Who is bothered about that medal, yaar. I never asked for it. They gave it to me. They can take away all the 20 medals.”

In 1996, Gill was found guilty of outraging the modesty of Rupan, eight years after she complained that the police officer had “pinched” her “posterior” at a party where he was said to be drunk.

After final appeals before the Supreme Court in July 2005, the conviction was upheld, but the three months’ jail sentence was reduced to probation. The victim declined to accept monetary compensation and the court ordered that it be donated to women's organisations.