Another sort of ‘discrimination’ if that is what you call it was when I was recently in another small city and there were two other women with me who weren’t used to the sort of hooliganism that men create in such places, by laughing loudly, staring, bumping into you deliberately etc. and they wanted to get away from there asap. It boils down creating the right kind of atmosphere so that nobody feels unwelcome but when that does not happen, women will just have to make themselves welcome, whether men like it or not.

If you guys stay in Bangalore the why not all like minded work towards this, I am sure you guys must already be working but please make it more inclusive. I am all up for this.

By the way on eintimation to you all, please note that on Feb 7th, we working in many companies together r organizing a peace protest against Mangalore attacks and as I don’t have your IDs please mail me at mindraneelbm@yahoo.com or call me at 9342210058.

We need people to express their anguish vi athis peace procession.

I live in Bangalore too, and I travel alone a lot as part of my work. Every possible scenario you can imagine – in buses, taxis, in the backs of tempos, at night, in all kinds of locations. I have stayed alone, in (small, local) hotels in small towns in states like Jharkhand.

There is only one way to counter the notion of eateries/public spaces de facto only meant for men, and that is to claim it for yourself, in a quiet, matter of fact way.

Obviously, when you are one of the first few to venture in, you are going to attract some attention of the kind that is not welcome. But the more you do it, and the more women do it, the legitimacy for women to share that space becomes more recognised.

It’s like long-distance travel alone. It’s so much more commonplace for women to travel alone now, even long distance travel, and women from so many more social classes – not just middle class women.

Or renting a house as a single woman. Even given the still prevalent reluctance, think of how many more single women of your own acquaintance have moved into accommodation on their own (or sharing with friends) compared to ten or fifteen years ago, and you will see how much things have changed in a comparatively short time.

My father who is retired, and lets out a couple of small flats to support himself, routinely actively seeks out single women tenants, who he swears are model tenants. This is the same man who, at the end of ‘94, threatened to throw me out of the house for not falling in with his marriage plans for me, and said he would ensure that I did not get a place to live in in Bangalore (and I knew he could so easily carry out his threat – a couple of nuisance calls, and any potential landlords would have backed off.)

There was no need for “the Catholic girl” to remain seated on the bus and starve. (By the way, what relevance does her Catholicism have, in this context? If you had said “young”, or “first time traveller”, it would have been more apposite. There were many possible responses – you could have invited her to eat with you, and assured her that it was safe, with so many people around. She could have joined one of the families – people around the world tend to be more often friendly and helpful than not. She could have requested someone to buy her a snack.

So tell me, since one of the main purposes of stops like these is also to use whatever functional loo arrangements there are, did she not empty her bladder either?

Let’s hope she shows a teaspoonful more gumption the next time, and the traveller sitting next to her is actively helpful. So many spaces have been claimed for so many women, compared to even a decade ago, but so many more remain to be claimed. And the only way to do it is to do it, as Mahatma Gandhi put it, to be the change that you want to see in the world.

And 99% of the time it will work. There is of course, the chance, that 1% of the time, you will run into louts of the Sri Ram Sena variety.

But then, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Cheers!