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India: Negotiating for Space
By Women's Feature Service
Extract from 'Gender and the Built Environment in India'; Edited by Madhavi Desai; Published by Zubaan Books; Price: Rs 545; Pp: 262
(Note: Please give credit to Women's Feature Service, the author of the book, and the publisher. Thank you.)
New Delhi,(WFS) -
Women's movements and social and cultural reform movements have created an increasing mobility for women in the public. This is particularly true of a commercial city like Mumbai... It is therefore not unusual for women to discuss how much 'space' this city affords them relative to others in India or that it gives them relatively lower levels of anxiety in regard to public space.
A woman in her early 30s who migrated from Delhi described how 'liberated' she felt living in Mumbai. "Here", she said, "when I go home late at night from work, I don't feel like I am going to be attacked any moment. Sure, I'm cautious, one has to be, but I'm not terrified."
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The reasons that underlie women's experience of relative freedom in Mumbai are multiple. Part of the answer lies in the presence of a large and visible workforce of women workers, white and blue collar... Further, one cannot but acknowledge the role of urban transport in furthering Mumbai's reputation as a safe city. Local trains (on the western and central routes) and B.E.S.T. (Bombay Electric and Suburban Transport) buses run almost 24 hours a day which, in terms of security and coverage, might fall short of the best international standards but are arguably better than anything else in the country.
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The reasons that underlie women's experience of relative freedom in Mumbai are multiple. Part of the answer lies in the presence of a large and visible workforce of women workers, white and blue collar... Further, one cannot but acknowledge the role of urban transport in furthering Mumbai's reputation as a safe city. Local trains (on the western and central routes) and B.E.S.T. (Bombay Electric and Suburban Transport) buses run almost 24 hours a day which, in terms of security and coverage, might fall short of the best international standards but are arguably better than anything else in the country.
In addition, there is a large fleet of taxis and rickshaws that again, while not being safe in absolute terms, have earned a 'reputation' for being relatively safe, in that few incidents of assault by taxi or rickshaw drivers are reported. Also important is the way in which residential and commercial areas of the city are intermeshed - leaving few areas that are completely deserted during the night. ...
Despite Mumbai offering a tangible sense of freedom and space to women, the responsibility of negotiating any 'danger' continues to lie with them. Every day women strategise to minimise risks to safety even as they seek to maximise access to public space.
If one observes women, particularly those walking on their own, one usually sees them doing something - shopping, heading towards bus-stops and railway stations, but rarely, if ever, loitering around, sitting in a park or 'maidan' or simply watching the world go by as one often sees men doing. The underlying assumption is that if women have no work to be accomplished they should return to the spaces where they really belong, like the domestic space. ...
In the last six years there has been an escalation in violence against women in public spaces and one of the forms this has assumed is that of stone throwing and attacks on women in the ladies' compartments of local trains... It is too simplistic to suggest that these incidents are the frustrated reactions of the deprived communities living along the railway tracks. If this were the case, the attacks would not be aimed largely at ladies' compartments. These instances of violence are a source of fear for women commuters.
While travelling on local trains late at night, it is not unusual to hear stories of fear. One woman spoke of how she spent an entire journey changing bogies at almost every station, as she was unable to decide where she felt safe. Another woman spoke of how she holds her cell phone with the police control room number 100 already punched in. Many women believe that their cell phones give them a sense of security as they may be able to call for help if required. Whether this sense of security is real or perceived is a moot point.
In response to attacks, the railway authorities announced that additional railway police would be on duty for the protection of women commuters. Police personnel were to be deployed in all ladies' compartments between 1 p.m. and 5 p.m. on holidays and between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m. daily. But the railway police is overwhelmingly staffed by men. There have been mixed reactions to this policy. On the one hand, this increased policing on the island trains at night meant that several women commuters felt safer because of the presence of gun-toting policemen. On the other hand, some women said that the policemen would themselves often leer at the women commuters. And a few said that they would never travel alone in a compartment with the policemen...
Recently, in a Kalyan-bound Central Railway train, a railway police constable molested a 20-year-old student in the afternoon. Interestingly, following this incident the Central and Western Railways jointly issued an advertisement suggesting that for their own safety women should not travel alone in the 'ladies compartments'. This suggests that if the women are attacked, it will be their own fault. Nor does the presence of other passengers provide women with a sense of security.
Women's lack of access to public space manifests itself in terms of their virtual erasure in relation to the provision of infrastructure. For instance, in the provision of toilets it would not be difficult to demonstrate this erasure.
The lack of public toilets is more than a mere inconvenience for women, it is a denial of their public policy needs and an abuse of their time-serving to negate their presence as citizens.
In most Indian cities, there aren't even equal toilet facilities for men and women. In Mumbai, one comes across little tiled box-like structures that are men's urinals without any sign of similar arrangements for women. There is also a completely unembarrassed air about this disparity.
When toilets are provided by the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai or by Sulabh International, an NGO, there is a clear disparity in the numbers of toilets for men and women. Where men have separate urinals (usually free) and toilets, women only have a toilet section. Typically there are about two toilets for women to three toilets for men and a number of urinal stands (usually between four and eight). Furthermore, the toilet section is paid and also closes during the night creating a situation where sometimes at night there are no public facilities open to women in some areas.
The existing toilets are seldom designed taking into account the needs of menstruating, lactating women and women with infants and young children. Few, if any, public toilets have changing tables or feeding rooms. Even dustbins are rarely provided.
Women often justify this disparity in the provision of facilities in terms of the disparity in the use of public space. Such justifications and discrimination in the provision of infrastructure underlines the assumption that the proper place for women is in the home. Similarly employers plead the absence of toilets for women to avoid hiring women. This emphasises the fact that not only are there fewer women in public space than men, but it is assumed that this will always be the case...
Women's access to public spaces and their geographical and temporal mobility is based on multiple binaries that compel them to negotiate both the perceptions and realities of potential danger while retaining some measure of independence. Accessing public space even in a 'safe city' like Mumbai means a subtle dance around multiple defined and undefined borders and boundaries or 'Lakshman rekhas'.
(Extracted from 'Gender and the Built Environment in India'; Edited by Madhavi Desai; Published by Zubaan Books; Price: Rs 545; Pp: 262)
1,190 words
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