Bhubaneswar, May 8: Controversies continue to dog the Orissa Cooperative Housing Corporation (OCHC) Limited.

A case was filed against the manager and two other employees of the corporation yesterday for outraging the modesty of a junior clerk. They were today sent to jail after their bail pleas were rejected by a local court.

The manager, Dhuleswar Sasmal, and the two others, Abhinna Chandra Das and Prashant Kumar Bastia, had been arrested yesterday following a complaint by the clerk, Kanaklata Badapanda.

Sources said that the complainant was one of the 13 corporation employees suspended in the wake of an incident on April 29 in which some employees had forged the signature of the corporation’s chairman and later locked him up in a room on the office premises.

According to the complaint lodged by the 38-year-old employee, she was manhandled and molested by the manager and his accomplices while she was preparing to go home for lunch yesterday.

“The three came to me and asked me to put my signature on a piece of paper. The paper said that I was withdrawing my membership from the workers’ union of the corporation. When I refused to sign, they abused me and threatened to kill me. They even manhandled me,” alleged the victim,

She also added that as she tried to leave the room but the accused pulled her by her saree and tried to outrage her modesty.

They shoved her against an almirah and injured her. At that time, her colleague Kumudini Mohapatra entered the room and started inquiring about the incident.

“They even abused her and the manager chased her with a stick. We ran for our lives. I went home and told my husband the entire incident. It was on his advice that I reported the matter to the police,” said Badapanda.

Her colleague, Kumudini, a widow, has also lodged a complaint accusing the manager of abusing her and trying to kill her.

The Mahila police registered a case under sections 341 (wrongful restraint), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 294 (obscene acts and songs), 506 (criminal intimidation), 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty) and 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the Indian Penal Code.

In another development, chairman of the corporation Om Prakash Ray said that the case against the manager, who was going to retire in another eight months, was false.

“Badapanda, along with 12 others, was suspended on May 3 for unruly behaviour in the office. Those arrested on the charge of forging my signature are also out on bail and are trying to create problems. These people have masterminded yesterday’s case,” said Ray, adding that steps would be taken to secure the bail of three employees who appear to have been framed.