Lifestyle Women & Society Places Digital Vibes Health Offbeat Entertainment World Watch Man Who Knew Infinity Prev Issue Next Issue

In a city where women are routinely groped on buses, and reports of abduction by taxi or autorickshaw drivers abound, the well-policed metro has proved liberating for female commuters in New Delhi.

Indian women sit on a metro train
© AFP/File Prakash Singh

As many as 500,000 people now ride the gleaming metro, which has given women, in particular, greater independence.

"If the metro wasn't there we wouldn't be going on this trip," said Anukriti Sinha, 17, who was headed with a friend from the city centre to a new mall in West Delhi after school let out.

"An auto is not a safe thing but here there are many people," said Sinha.

Sprawling New Delhi now spans almost 1,500 square kilometers, and even lifelong residents find themselves increasingly unfamiliar with the city.

But over the last three years, the metro has gradually connected government offices and shops in the city's colonial-era center with Mughal Old Delhi and with newly established residential neighborhoods.

Sinha, dressed in her uniform of a white shirt and pleated skirt, said the outing was the first time she had traveled so far from her East Delhi home without her parents.

Indian women ride the escalator to take the metro train in New Delhi
© AFP Prakash Singh

Jyotsna Saluja, a housewife, said that the metro's arrival meant she no longer had to wait for her husband to have a day off in order to visit her parents.

"One can go on one's own, one doesn't have to depend on anyone," said long-haired Saluja, who has taken the metro on her own, but was accompanied on this visit by her in-laws.

The new-found sense of security women report feeling on the metro is due in part to its strong police presence.

All passengers must pass through metal detectors, manned by several policemen, to enter the stations.

There are no "women-only" carriages, as there are in Egypt's Cairo metro, but police officers ride the cars, which are equipped with call boxes.

Some female passengers also say a different "class" of passengers travels by metro.

Bhavna Yadav, 25, said she believed the cost of the metro kept out the people who might be more likely to annoy women travellers.

An Indian women carries a child on a metro
© AFP/File Prakash Singh

"The fare is more. That is a big factor," said the petite Yadav, who paid 16 rupees (36 US cents) to take a bus and then the metro to go shopping alone, while doing the entire journey by bus would have cost seven rupees.

Until the metro's arrival, the dilapidated and overcrowded bus system was the city's only mode of public transport.

But added to the constant worry of being felt up, erratic schedules and long travel times made the non-air conditioned and often windowless bus an excruciating option.

That made people like civil servant B.K. Chaddha stay put after returning to her Northeast Delhi home in the afternoon.

"I never used to leave Shahdara after three," said the middle-aged Chaddha, who lives near the city's oldest line, which started running in December 2002.

Chaddha now takes the air-conditioned and spotless metro to worship at a Sikh temple in Old Delhi, a trip that takes under an hour instead of the almost two hours it used to.

A Metro train crosses a multiplex in New Delhi
© AFP/File Manpreet Romana

Although passengers getting on do push past those getting off, some -- pointing to the lack of groping, spitting or littering -- still say the metro has had a civilizing affect on Delhi residents, at least while they are on it.

"People are less pushy compared to the bus. They are obeying the rules," said Prachi, a psychologist, traveling from East Delhi. Like many in India she goes by one name.

"I think it is because people feel proud of the metro."

While women have been the most obvious beneficiaries of the metro's speed and security, city travel has become safer for men too.

"Road rage is another thing that the metro has really helped with," said Saikot Ghosh, a marketing professional who takes the metro every day. "I used to get so frustrated driving."

Clashes provoked by road rage are increasing in this city of 1.4 million cars, where it can take 45 minutes to drive 10 kilometers at rush hour.

In January, newspapers reported that a man shot a driver whose car scraped his, as well as a pedestrian who tried to intervene.

The metro has also allowed commuters a touch of vanity.

"The helmet ruined my hair, my clothes used to turn black," said Sunil Dutt, co-owner of a card shop in Old Delhi, who used to travel by motorcycle.

"After the metro came I bought a white shirt. And I started to comb my hair."

View and Post comment on this article

© 2005 AFP. All rights of reproduction and distribution reserved. All information displayed on this section (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.