Transport & Mobility: What can it teach India about intersectional feminism?
“For work opportunities, computer classes, everything, I have to travel far, and it costs a lot. If I have more money, I can pursue more dreams.” [1] — Naina, 21
So it turns out transport & mobility are feminist issues!
In Chapter 1 of Caroline Criado Perez’s bestseller, Invisible Women: Exposing data bias in a world designed for men, we learn through data about how an issue as innocuous as delayed snow-clearing in Karlskoga, Sweden, was disproportionately affecting women. [2]
What can transport & mobility teach us about intersectional feminism in an Indian context?
feminism (n): the belief that women and men should have equal rights and opportunities.
“During COVID, everything was closed, so father’s company was closed. My financial challenge is high, because I have 3 siblings. But my father took a loan and paid fees. Home is far away from college, and it takes more money to go there.” says Naina, a 21 year old athlete who lives in Khadda Colony, Delhi.
“Metro one side is Rs. 60 and the other side is also Rs. 60. So I just go by auto and bus. Bus is free for women in Delhi. But if I have to travel far from home I have to have Rs. 50–60 extra for sports camps.”
Context: Women’s Mobility in India
It starts with societal norms. As seen in the recent Malayalam hit The Great Indian Kitchen, women have traditionally played domestic roles in households, performing unpaid care work (household chores, caring for family members), while men go out to earn. Women’s reasons to go outside of their home revolve around family duties and responsibilities, and they require a strong reason to leave home for pleasure.
Societal norms lead to restricted mobility. Even before COVID-19, only 54% of women were allowed to visit nearby markets on their own. Only 48% could visit places outside their village or community by themselves. [3] This has restricted a woman’s access to own personal vehicles and drives up her costs in terms of money and time while pursuing education or employment.
Available mobility options are rife with safety issues. According to UN Women 95% of women aged 16–49 years feel unsafe in public spaces in the capital city of Delhi. [4] 50% of sexual harassment cases against women in cities took place while using public transport and 16% while waiting for public transport. [5]
Safe mobility costs money. In order to travel in safety, women choose more expensive modes of travel like cabs and metros, especially after sunset. It is estimated that women are willing to pay Rs. 18,800 more per year than men (almost twice the yearly tuition) and travel 40 additional minutes to travel safely to their colleges. Female students of Delhi University were even willing to attend a lower-ranking college if the college lies on a safer route. [6]
Money comes with opportunity (which also requires mobility). 10 million girls from marginalised communities in India could drop out of secondary school due to the digital divide in remote learning. [7] Being at home has led to more domestic work with 96% of females in Uttar Pradesh reporting an increase in workload, with 67% of them being below 18 years of age. [8] Vocational education plays a role in the process of moving from an unpaid status to paid working status. [9] However, only 3.8% of India’s adult women have received vocational training.[10] Eight months after the lockdown, 13% fewer women than a year ago were employed or looking for jobs, compared to 2% fewer men, data show. [11]
“We have a bike which my father uses to go to work. Since bus is free for women in Delhi, for me it costs Rs. 40 to travel extra by auto and reach my college.
It will be better if it was Rs. 15 to travel one way and Rs. 15 to travel the other way (totally Rs. 30).” — Naina [1]
Opinion: Practising Intersectional Feminism
It’s been 30 years since the term Intersectional Feminism was coined by lawyer-activist Kimberlé Crenshaw to describe how race, class and gender “intersect” with one another. The term has more recently gained wide visibility through viral content on social media. Eg. This video by Buzzfeed India on the intersection of gender and caste.
But conversations at large have remained intellectual (case-in-point, the non-toxic, and articulate comments section for the very same video on YouTube). Intersectional feminism needs to permeate our day-to-day worldview.
The case Perez makes in Invisible Women is to apply a gender lens to everyday issues — be it mobility, healthcare, sanitation or education — to understand how problems affect marginalised groups differently. This can allow us to be more equitable in everyday decision-making, data collection, and policy-making.
WE NEED MORE WOMEN AT THE WHEEL, driving decisions on mobility. We need:
Personal mobility options: In Bihar, the free bicycle program in 2006 led to an increase in secondary school enrolment by 32%. [12] As Shabana Mitra and Karl Ove Moen write in Ideas for India [13] the impact of the program goes beyond an increase in enrolment. It includes shifts in attitudes amongst both women and men as girls riding bicycles to school becomes a daily norm. It also signals a shift in the aspirations of the girls. Those who received a bicycle were more likely “to complete their education, look for productive jobs outside agriculture, and delay marriage.”
Safe infrastructure for shared mobility: More e-buses [14], mean less congestion on the roads (and inside the buses), and less pollution. Coupled with well-lit and sheltered bus stops, they become a safer option for women as well.
However, from the recent pilot conducted in Bhopal, research revealed that 100% drivers and conductors interviewed were of the opinion that women harassment was not a prevalent issue in Bhopal. 30% of drivers & conductors also believed that women were equally responsible for the harassment. [15] This signals a need to improve human capacity in understanding and dealing with sexual harassment, in addition to improved infrastructure.
Micro-mobility for trip-chaining: Trip Chaining refers to the phenomenon where a single trip consists of multiple stops. This has been most common with women who “chain” multiple trips together from picking up children at school, to running errands, to accompanying the elderly on medical visits. The Bhopal pilot revealed that around 50% of Indian women undertake multiple activities per trip. More than 30% of the women travel with dependents, in comparison to 16% of men. [15] In such cases, micro-mobility options like Yulus in Bangalore and Share Autos could be useful, but may need to consider minimal tech interfacing as many women in India still own function phones.
These are some ways that an intersectional feminism lens is required in equitable Transport & Mobility policy design.
What are some other areas that require the same lens?
Sources:
- Primary research with Naina, 2022 (name changed to protect privacy)
- Include Gender: Gender Equal Snow Clearing in Karlskoga
- ADB: It is Time to Address COVID-19’s Disproportionate Impact on India’s Women
- survey by UN Women
- Women and Mobility by the Asia Foundation
- IGC: Matter of mobility: Barriers to women’s work and education, and the dangers at home
- India Today: How Covid-19 pandemic disrupted female education
- Population Foundation: Policy Brief: The Impact Of Covid-19 On Women
- Nature: Unfolding unpaid domestic work in India
- OFR Online: The Skilling Imperative in India
- Business Standard: Covid impact: Women workforce disappearing, most affected in urban India
- Cycling to School: Increasing Secondary School Enrollment for Girls in India By Karthik Muralidharan and Nishith Prakash
- Ideas for India: Wheels of power: Long-term effects of the Bihar Cycle Programme
- Financial Express: Future of public transport in India — Electric Buses
- Women’s Safety In Public Transport: A Pilot Initiative in Bhopal
