CHENNAI: There are parts of the world where gender segregation occurs for reasons of anti-sexuality driven morality codes. This may happen both in public, such as in religious spaces and institutions of learning, as well as privately, in how household spaces are demarcated or utilised. India, obviously, has those codes as well, and they can be rigid. However, in this country, gender segregation isn’t only regressive. It is also, in a strange way, semi-progressive: it exists in certain contexts in order to protect women — from Indian men and their obscene and violent ways.
Ladies’ compartments have been a fixture on certain short-haul trains in Indian cities for a long time, and these have been widely used especially by women who work outside the home and commute to their workplaces. Their existence is a safety measure not only in terms of the obvious aspect of being less likely to be preyed on during a commute, but also help some people convince their families to accept or allow their careers.
A few months ago, the air carrier Indigo introduced women-friendly seating on its planes, providing this option during booking. A few months into this initiative, travellers are actively choosing it. The service was availed between 60%-70% times more often in August than it was in July, probably as a result of increased recent public awareness about it.
A spate of sexual harassment cases in the air involving Indian men — including everything from urinating on co-passengers to assault — have made headlines in the last couple of years. Shocking incidents aside, the deep discomfort that many men make women travellers feel is something that companies have also taken seriously.
The electric bus company NueGo also has options where one can choose to be seated beside another woman during the journey. Other vehicle carriers across the country may already offer the same, or may soon start to.
It’s necessary. We don’t like in a utopian India in which such segregation would be an insult or repressive. We live in a deeply misogynistic India where homes, offices, public places, public transportation, institutions and just about every imaginable space is a space where there is a risk for anyone who is not a cis-het man. Actually, more specifically: a cis-het, upper caste Hindu man. That means there are a lot of at-risk categories of people, for different reasons (which may all have their roots in caste-based patriarchy).
Historically, the response to risk has been to over-protect. Consider how it is women and girls who are always made or persuaded to remain at home at night, while men — who more often than not are responsible for the crimes to be shielded from — roam free. What’s great about female-friendly seat selection is that it acknowledges the problem squarely, and it doesn’t punish the at-risk. It just makes us more comfortable.
In Indigo’s initiative, women are quite literally — as well as of course metaphorically, for the more hopeful among us — encouraged to fly, and fly solo too. It’s an inclusive action, which may seem like a misnomer when it comes to segregation, but it isn’t. Here, it increases equity, while equality remains far on the horizon.