Working women in cities have never had it easy when commuting to and from work. Be it metros, buses or local trains. Public transport has always been overcrowded making it easy for eve-teasers and similar indecent elements to harass the womenfolk.
On this backdrop, Pune has launched a special bus service for women called ‘Tejaswini’. ‘Tejaswini’ will operate in the major work zones of the city during am and pm rush hours – a total of 8 hours; right from 7 am to 11 am and 5 pm to 9 pm. The buses will be 100% women driven with women drivers and conductors running the service and the entire bus will be reserved for women passengers.
The chief executive officer of Pune Mahanagar Parivahan Mahamandal Limited (PMPML), Sushma Kolhe, told TOI, "We had sent a proposal to the state government in June-July 2016 seeking funds to purchase 100 buses for this service."
Now, a project implementation committee would be formed for this service, with the municipal commissioner as the president and general manager (transport) as the member secretary. The committee would decide the number of routes and models of buses.
In Pimpri Chinchwad, a large number of women work in the many small, medium and big industries in industrial areas. Similarly many women work in the IT companies in Rajiv Gandhi IT park in Hinjewadi. However, there are only a few PMPML buses that run through the industrial areas in Pimpri Chinchwad.
Earlier in 2016, the state government had approved Tejaswini bus services for Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Thane, Nagpur and Kalyan-Dombivli. A total of 300 Tejaswini buses were provided for women in these cities. In March 2016, the state government had budgeted Rs 50 crore for the 'Tejaswini Buses' project. Maharashtra's Finance Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar had said he wanted women to travel comfortably and safely.
This bus service is not a first and not the last in our country. Other cities in India like Mumbai, Delhi and Kashmir also have had a similar ‘women-only’ bus service. Also, countries like Mexico, Japan and UK have been experimenting with women-only passenger cars, trains and metros.
This according to us is a great move! Not only will this service make it easy for urban working women to travel safely and comfortably to work and back home, it will also ease the pressure on the roads that private vehicles create thus making our environment smile on us too.
Pune SHEROES, that makes it two reasons for us to smile!