Bus, Nurse & Bihar --

Yesterday I came to know from the face book page of the ‘All India Radio News’ that 30 year-old V Saritha becomes the first women driver of the Delhi Transport Corporation. This is a small but very significant step towards women empowerment. Delhi is notorious place as far as women security is concerned. Women feel very unsafe travelling in public transport. Women driver in the bus will instil a new confidence among women passenger. Delhi Transport Corporation should employ more women driver and conductor for the buses. If they do so in near future, it will surely improve the condition of women safety and security in public transport.






V.Saritha ( Courtesy - AIR News )

Sometimes I wonder when my state Bihar will have women drivers and conductors in private and public buses. Bihar is still orthodox as far as women employment is concerned. People have very biased notion about working women and their professions.Nursing , which is female dominated profession , that also is not seen as respected profession in Bihar. There is (In )famous saying in my area -


‘Bigdail Beta Bus main

Bigdail Beti Nurse main’

means

‘Spoiled son joins bus

spoiled daughter becomes nurse’


General perception about working in bus( which is somewhat true too ) is that, those who are uneducated, spoiled, no agriculture land or no other livelihood, generally they only join as bus conductor/ driver. After working few years as bus conductor, some conductors graduate to driver. The working condition of bus conductor is horrible. They are paid little, have to work from morning to till ten o’clock night. They have to deal with local muscle man at every stop and have to pay some fixed money. Most of the bus conductor start drinking after joining the job and some of them became addicted to drinking. Even though they try to be courteous before well to do passengers but generally they use abusive language and their behaviour cannot be considered ideal or up to the mark. The condition of driver is as bad as the conductor’s condition. The social status of driver and conductor is as low as agriculture labourer. The working condition of driver and conductor, who are in state transport, are somewhat better than in comparison to those who are under private owner but again general traits and social status of conductors and drivers are same. When working condition for men not considered as ideal or respected in buses; working women in buses is beyond imagination at this point.


There is general sentiment among the people that nurses have loose moral values. General sentiments about them are they have to work in day and night, work for strange male and female & sometimes they terminate the pregnancy so they in fact encourage immoral & impious activities among married and unmarried.


I find biases against these professions ridiculous and uncalled for. In my opinion nurse is one of the noble professions in the world. Due to three accidents in my life, I had to spend three long times (each time more than two months) in the hospital. During that time, I got opportunity to interact with many nurses and got treatment by their hands. I saw and felt their work very closely. In fact, not only I got well in the hospital but I also learnt a lot from their discipline and commitment for work.


Bihar will have to go long way to employ its daughters in buses and other public/ private transport. The state will have to create awareness about the benefit of women employee in every field, reinforce law and order situation, a complete check on local muscle man, improve road ,a proper safety mechanism not only for passengers but also for drivers and conductors. At present, the mobility of women is very restricted in Bihar. Hardly ten percent of women travel in the bus and those who travel in the bus , most of the time they accompany with their family member. Expect few cities like Patna, Muzaffarpur, generally women do not feel safe travelling alone. The state should employ, a large number of women in every profession like police, teacher, nurses, conductor, driver for better Bihar, women empowered Bihar. If the state employs a large number of women driver and conductor, that will be an indicator of improved law and order condition of the state.




~~~ Ramanuj Dubey