On April 16, about 50 Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) employees quietly arrived at the Nashik office in sweltering heat as anxiety rose over reports that the unit could soon shut down.
For TCS, the Nashik unit is but a tiny operation of about 170 employees, given the IT giant's scale. Yet allegations of sexual harassment and workplace misconduct over four years, as detailed in police complaints now under investigation, have drawn outsized scrutiny, triggering protests, heightened security and internal reviews.
A Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed by the Nashik police is probing eight accused persons across nine FIRs, which include charges of mental and sexual harassment, obscene remarks, unwanted physical contact, hostile workplace conditions and hurting religious sentiments.
For a company with more than 584,000 employees globally, the Nashik business process outsourcing (BPO) unit, spread across 5,000 sq ft and employing around 170 people across two shifts for a large banking client, would typically be a rounding-off error.
Yet, on the ground, the situation appeared tense on April 16. Sources told Moneycontrol that employees were offered work-from-home arrangements amid safety concerns, particularly after an alleged attempt by a local political group to vandalise the office earlier in the week.
When this reporter reached the gates of Ashoka Business Enclave on that day, inside which the TCS office is located, at least a dozen police officers were guarding the premises. Inside the compound, private security personnel screened every passerby.
Meanwhile, a protest led by Devyani Pharande, a BJP MLA from Nashik (Central), saw a large gathering of women raising slogans outside the complex.
In response, TCS has hired Deloitte and Trilegal as independent advisors to support its internal investigation, which is being overseen by Aarthi Subramanian, President and Chief Operating Officer of TCS.
The company has also constituted an Oversight Committee, chaired by independent director Keki Mistry, to review findings and recommend further action.
FIR trail
The case originated with a complaint filed on March 25 by a 23-year-old woman at the Deolali Camp police station in Nashik. The FIR named Danish Sheikh, Tausif Attar and Nida Khan, alleging rape, sexual harassment and religious coercion between 2022 and 2026.
Subsequently, eight more FIRs were registered at the Mumbai Naka police station by early April. Moneycontrol has reviewed copies of all nine FIRs.
Across these complaints, the key accused include Danish Sheikh (named in two FIRs), Tausif Attar (six FIRs), Shafi Shaikh (four FIRs), Raza Memon (five FIRs), Shahrukh Qureshi (four FIRs), Asif Ansari (two FIRs), Nida Khan (one FIR) and Ashwini Chainani (one FIR).
Nida Khan, a telecaller and process associate based in Pune, faces allegations related to hurting religious sentiments.
Ashwini Chainani, a delivery operations head also based in Pune and responsible for the Nashik unit, has been accused of inaction on one of the complaints. Neither holds an HR role at the Nashik facility.
The first major FIR
Danish had known the 23-year-old complainant since January 2022. He was a college senior, and they would often meet as friends, the complainant said in the FIR. Later, the accused tried to get physically intimate with her in mid of 2022, on the pretext of marriage, and the complainant resisted his advances.
After she graduated that year with a BCA degree, Danish suggested that she apply to TCS, where he worked. The complainant got the job as an associate in 2023 and started spending time with him and his colleagues, Tausif and Nida, at the office canteen.
The four had a WhatsApp group, where Tausif and Nida would allegedly discuss the differences between Hinduism and Islam with the complainant and try to convince her that their religion was superior. According to the FIR, Danish, on occasions, had hurt the complainant’s religious sentiments.
The allegations got murkier in August 2024, when Danish and the complainant were out on a bike ride, and he took her to a resort on Trimbak Road in Nashik and allegedly forced her to have sex with him, according to the FIR. Following this, Tausif allegedly began blackmailing her by threatening to disclose the relationship to her family if she resisted his advances, the FIR said.
In February 2026, Danish’s wife reached out to the complainant, revealing that he is already married and has two children. When confronted, Danish said he never intended to marry the complainant. The FIR was then registered on March 25.
Nida is currently absconding, and Nashik Police has sent three search teams to find her.
Her lawyers, Rahul Kasliwal and Baba Sayyed, filed an anticipatory bail plea at Nashik Sessions Court on Saturday.
What did the other FIRs say?
The complainant informed the police of similar mental and sexual harassment happening with other colleagues in the office. The police acted swiftly, forming an SIT led by Assistant Police Commissioner (Crime) Sandeep Mitke of Nashik Police.
“After the first complaint, we sent a group of female police officers to get in touch with other women employees in the office to encourage them to come forward and file complaints. That led to nine FIRs getting registered,” Mitke told Moneycontrol.
“The other FIRs were focused on molestation allegations, passing uncomfortable comments on the women’s attire and personal lives. FIRs also claimed the accused would talk down on other religions, mainly Hinduism, while promoting Islamic practices,” he added.
Among the nine FIRs, eight were filed by women and one by a male employee. Most of the women targeted were aged around 23-25 years and came from humble, economically weaker backgrounds, the police said. Two complainants are in their mid-30s.
According to the FIRs accessed, a common pattern of alleged harassment involved repeatedly asking women intrusive questions about their private lives, despite them not wanting to answer. This included questions on whether they had physical relationships with their boyfriends, whether they were going on a honeymoon with their spouse, commenting on a woman with Polycystic Ovarian Disease (PCOD), and telling one of the complainants to work on her body and lose weight.
A complainant stated, “In December 2024, Shafi Shaikh sat next to me on a chair for no reason and on the pretext of helping me in my work, he deliberately tried to rub my feet with his feet. He also touched my chest with his hands on the pretext of using the keyboard. I understood his intention, and when I immediately moved my chair aside, he smiled at me and left from there.”
“One Sunday in February 2026, during lunchtime, Tausif, who worked in the dialer team in our office, came to me and asked about my health. I told him that I recently had a miscarriage and was not feeling well. At that time, Tausif said, 'I will give you the mobile number of a cleric in Ajmer. I assure you that after going to Ajmer, you will have a child. You should go there once.' I found it embarrassing for him to talk about my personal life in this way, so I did not respond at the time. But he has repeatedly tried to discuss this subject even when I did not want to,” said another complainant in the FIR.
A complainant, who got married in 2025, said in her FIR mentioning Shahrukh, “On March 19, I had come to the office wearing a saree for Gudi Padwa. At that time, around 12.00 pm, while I was in the office, Shahrukh came and sat next to me, looked at me strangely and said, "Today you look different, let’s go out somewhere today?" I felt uncomfortable listening to his words. I got up and left from there.”
She had verbally complained about Shahrukh and her team leader, Raza Memon, who would ask uncomfortable personal questions at the workplace, to operations head Ashwini Chainani in February 2026 and March 2026. The complainant alleged that Ashwini didn’t take any action and told her, “Why do you want to get highlighted? Let it go.”
Public prosecutor Kiran Bendbhar, who is representing eight out of the nine complainants, told Moneycontrol that Ashwini Chainani was also in fact a part of the company’s Prevention of Sexual Harassment (POSH) committee, yet she failed to raise the complaints.
TCS has a common POSH committee for its Pune and Nashik offices, sources said.
Bendbhar said that Shafi Shaikh is an “accused in several cases”.
Back in 2022, a complainant sent an email to senior manager Nitin Kapoor, alleging that Shafi had stared at her inappropriately, and he was then shifted to another department.
“Women have been facing these issues from 2022 to 2026. To continue in their jobs, they were avoiding filing complaints. Many of them are from poorer families. But now that these cases are in the court, we expect more victims to come forward and file formal complaints,” Bendbhar said.
‘No Forceful Conversion’
Advocate Kasliwal, who is also representing Raza, Tausif, and Asif, said that so far the remand reports by police do not indicate any forceful conversion.
“TCS is a reputed company and hires people after thorough verifications. These victims and the accused are all well-educated and qualified. If this is a caste or religion issue, then I don’t think the victim would have taken three years to lodge a complaint. One of the accused had an affair with a girl. But just because they are from different religions, we can’t say the victim was forced to convert,” Kasliwal told Moneycontrol.
He added, “This is a case of an office affair gone wrong, but it is aggravating the situation merely because they are from different castes. If it’s a voluntary conversion, it’s still their right. There are no allegations of forceful conversion anywhere. There may have been instances of accused opposing Hindu religion, but that doesn’t mean they have asked the other person to accept Muslim religion.”
Kasliwal argued that all the allegations relate to individual conduct rather than the company, adding that whether the behaviour is appropriate depends on the relationship between the parties and the intent behind the act. He also said the offences carry sentences of under seven years, and according to the Supreme Court, such cases do not necessarily warrant immediate arrest.
Why didn’t the senior managers act?
SIT’s Mitke said the victims were scared because none of the managers they had been verbally raising complaints with took any action. The identities of some of these managers were revealed in the FIRs. In one of the FIRs, Raza himself was the senior with whom a complainant had shared her concern.
Mitke, however, noted that senior manager Kapoor did write several emails to Chainani over the past couple of years complaining against the group of accused, but those were work-related emails.
“Nitin Kapoor did write to Chainani regarding work disciplinary issues of the accused gang. They would come to the office late, and their work too wasn’t up to the mark. They would even bully colleagues. But Chainani didn’t take any action,” Mitke said.
Around 78 emails were sent to Chainani, which are currently under police probe.
Responding to Moneycontrol’s detailed queries, a TCS spokesperson said, “We wish to reiterate the statement issued concerning the matter on April 17, 2025. We are constrained on offering comments on specific queries as these are matters of present investigation.”
“We will also request you to exercise caution and diligence in reporting on these matters rather than depending on hearsay as advised by the investigating authorities in their social media post,” the spokesperson added.
Who is Ashwini Chainani?
Chainani has been a TCS employee for over 20 years, having led many projects and teams. She is based out of the IT firm’s Pune office and would visit the Nashik office once a month or as needed.
Advocate Mayur Deshpande, who, along with BR Deshpande, is representing Chainani, denied all the allegations against her. Deshpande told Moneycontrol, that she never got a complaint from the subordinate in question and the 78 emails under investigation, citing issues are all “work related” and not directly linked to the sexual harassment complaints.
“My client lives in Pune, and she is not even the HR person. She was in the middle of handing over and transitioning to a different project and had initiated the process in September 2025, following some disagreements with an immediate senior and junior employee on her team. March 2026 was supposed to be her last month,” Deshpande said.
He added, “She was called for questioning by the SIT between March 29 and 31. She travelled to the Nashik office, recorded her statement and came back. Suddenly, her name came up in a FIR filed on April 2, and she was taken into police custody. The complainant could have mentioned this while the SIT was speaking to their employees during their visit in March end. It’s shocking that she suddenly lodged a complaint.”
While other accused continue to be in police custody, Chainani has been moved to judicial custody till April 28. Additionally, the SIT team has reserved the right to keep Chainani in police custody for 10 days till May 19 as required for the investigation.
Hurting religious sentiments
Amid this, a nationwide uproar has cast the complaints as involving forced religious conversion, though eight of the FIRs only cited instances of hurting religious sentiments, with only one exception involving a 35-year-old male employee.
The 35-year-old, who claims to be a rudraksh-wearing follower of Hindu saint Ramdas Swami, alleged that he was forced to eat non-vegetarian food by Danish and Tausif.
In 2023, his team leader, Tausif, had allegedly taken him to his house during Ramzan Eid and made him wear his religious cap and recite namaz. He took a picture of the complainant and posted it in a WhatsApp group, where he was later added.
The employee alleged in the FIR that the accused insulted Hindu gods and in one instance called Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj a “slave of Muslim religion.”
“Tausif and Danish told me you tried taking medicine, yet your wife did not have a child, so send her to me. At that time, we had an argument, and Tausif had hit me in anger and threatened to kill me. After this, I had informed our Ashwini Madam,” the employee said.
He added, “When Tausif and Danish were telling me about their religion, I started ignoring them, and they tried to harass me through various ways. I understood that both of them were trying to convert me by speaking against Hinduism in our office, so I was against it. That is why they were very angry with me.”
Nashik Police Commissioner Sandeep Karnik said that his team has written to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) and the State Intelligence Department (SID) as well to examine whether any extremist organisations were linked to the accused in these cases.
Identity of Nashik unit HR head Unclear
Amid all of the chaos, the identity of the HR manager for the Nashik unit remains unclear. While most of the complaints at the company level were conveyed verbally, an email to Kapoor in 2022 led to Shafi being shifted to a different department, a move that would typically involve HR oversight.
On April 17, TCS confirmed through a statement that no formal complaints were raised through its POSH channels in the last four years.
“While detailed reviews are still underway, a preliminary review of the systems and records pertaining to the Nashik unit indicates that we have not received any complaints of the nature that are being alleged on either our ethics or POSH channels,” TCS CEO and MD K Krithivasan had said.
The IT services behemoth reiterated that it holds itself to the “highest standards of employee welfare and institutional conduct.”