At Sanjay Gandhi Transport Nagar (SGTN) in Delhi, the largest trucking hub in Asia, the air is thick with the smell of diesel, grease, and burnt rubber. Amid the roar of trucks and a sea of men in oil-stained overalls, Shanti Devi, 65, squats down to fix a tyre puncture, lifting the truck tyre almost as big as her torso. Draped in a peach-orange sari with a dark blue border, Shanti holds the tyre with a firm grip, her bangles jingling with every movement. In this male-dominated industry of grease and gears, where women are almost invisible, Shanti is creating history as India’s first woman truck mechanic.
Shanti’s journey began three decades ago when she migrated from Gwalior to Delhi with her husband, who is no more. “We came here with nothing,” she recalls. “In the beginning, I set up a small tea shop while my husband pulled a rickshaw to support our family.”
Life shifted when the couple turned their focus from tea to tyres. SGTN, spread across more than 75 acres, became their workplace. Over 70,000 trucks are parked here at any given time, with about 20,000 trucks passing daily. Shanti was relentless in carving her own place here.
“In the early days, I would watch my husband and other mechanics closely,” Shanti says. “At first, I didn’t even know how to hold the tools properly. But gradually, I picked up everything.” What started as assisting her husband soon became a full-time role. Today, she is known as ‘Ustad Ji’ among truckers—a term of respect usually reserved for seasoned male mechanics. “My work starts at six in the morning and continues till eleven at night,” she explains. “I repair around 10 to 15 tyres every single day. For the last 30 years, I’ve hardly taken a day off.”
For truck drivers, her presence is both surprising and inspiring. “It is very rare to see a woman here,” says Vinod Kumar, a truck driver from Uttar Pradesh. “I prefer to service my truck with her just to give her motivation. She shows us that nothing is impossible.”
The job is far from easy. A single truck tyre can weigh more than 50 kg. It usually takes two to three men to repair or replace one. But Shanti does it alone. “Initially, I was not able to do it by myself,” she admits. “But today I can proudly say I’ve repaired thousands of tyres on my own.”
Being the only woman here doesn’t seem to budge her. “I know that I am a better mechanic than most men here,” she says proudly. “Every day I prove it through my work.”
Still, her journey hasn’t been free of skepticism. “Drivers would whisper, ‘Will she really be able to do this?’” Shanti remembers. “But I never let their comments affect me. I didn’t care who was looking at me.”
Her relationship with truckers evolved with time. “When I was young, drivers used to call me didi (sister). Then they called me bhabhi (sister-in-law). And now, they call me dadi (grandmother),” she chuckles.
Even when she has created an example, other women tend to hesitate. “No woman has come forward to learn it. Maybe they think it is too hard,” she rues.
Despite her age, Shanti shows no signs of slowing down, even when her back aches occasionally. It is her spirit, she says, that remains unbroken. “I believe a woman can do any job if she has passion for it,” she asserts. “Strength is not in the muscles, it is in the mind.”