GEMSpeak: #RunSafe - How Can We Make Chennai Safe for Women Runners?

by Preeti Aghalyam

It has been an honour and a privilege to be identified as one of the Gender Equality Mobilisers (G.E.M.s) for 2014 by Prajnya. I look forward to participation in the movement beyond the 16 days campaign as well. For now, here is a round up from me:

Background:

I am a runner and as a vociferous member of the Chennai Runners club, have been talking recently about the safety of women runners on the streets of Chennai. A safety that I have always taken for granted. In the past couple of years, with the number of women runners increasing fairly dramatically, the number of incidents of groping, pushing, pinching, shouting, scaring, and general harassment have increased. I often find that women take this as par for the course and try not to talk in public about it, sort of accept it. I hope to break that mind-set, and also of course, figure out ways and means of keeping ourselves safe, enjoying our runs, and sending a clear message to the population that we won’t accept any harassment.

What we did:

• Safety Audits
• Social Media Discussions
• Signature Campaign 

A brief description:

If you drive or walk around in the Alwarpet/Mylapore area at normal times of day, chances are you will feel perfectly safe. It is busy, with commercial establishments, shoppers, pavement fruit sellers, and commuters. There aren't that many thriving tasmac shops. But we run at 5 am, when it’s dark and stray dogs are our only companions. A set of #SafetyAudits using the #SafetiPin app was a great way to kick start what I had named the #RunSafe campaign.

The discussions continued into the Social Media space then, targeting not only women runners in Chennai, but also all across the country. I invited friends to share their experiences using a googleform, which led to a discovery that some pockets of the beautiful Besantnagar area need a deeper look-in. I hope to spearhead some #SafetyAudits there in near future.

I also shared a number of ‘tips’ suggested by various people on how to ensure your own safety during runs. Such as from this handy site & sparked off discussions on what women are doing today in India. From knives to pepper spray to never running alone to this lady who resorted to violence there are many things to think about here. My daughter made us this pic to illustrate some of the very basic things:

Meanwhile, Anil, a friend of mine felt so enthused by it all that he wrote this blog post which is one of the best compilation of Safety Tips I have seen.

Finally, at The Hindu Health & Fitness Expo on Dec 6^th, as a precursor to The Wipro Chennai Marathon 2014, when 1800+ women ran on the streets of Chennai in three races (10, 21 & 42Km), we ran a suggestion board/signature campaign.  This was at once educational (we should have included cyclists in this campaign, not just runners) and inspirational (children gave us suggestions that make a lot of sense!).

Final words:

There is lot more to be done. My aim these past couple of weeks was to get people talking about this important issue of safety, in a general manner. All the talk has to lead to action. Some of it is individual – we all have to make changes. But a large part of it is lies with the administration, and as democratic citizens the responsibility is on us to drive it. I am going to use the #RunSafe tag often in the future, for sure.

Meet Our GEMS: Preeti Aghalayam

RUNNING SAFE

by Meera Srikant

Preeti is a Professor in Chemical Engineering & the Chairperson, Women's Forum, at IIT Madras. She has a PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and has worked as Assistant and Associate Professor at IIT Bombay. A life-time running addict, Preeti participates in several marathons and half marathons through the year. She is also on the organising committee of The Wipro Chennai Marathon, 2014, and a member of the vibrant Chennai Runners club. She is passionate about books, running, women's issues, and math, and is forever being put in her place by her 10-year old daughter (and resident critic). She shares why Prajnya campaign is important to her..

Why is this issue important to you?

I have specifically chosen to concentrate on the issue of raising awareness on safety on the streets for the increasing number of women runners we have in our midst. I am an extremely passionate runner, and as part of the organising team of several running events, I have discovered that one big reason women hesitate to get out into the open air for their exercise is that they feel unsafe. I have lived in several cities in the US and India, and have always managed to find the opportunity to enjoy the primal experience that running is, and I want to spread that joy. On a somewhat parallel note, as a professor, I also hope that my participation will enthuse my students, the younger generation, to come out and take up these issues and use their boundless energy and intelligence to come up with solutions.

What is it you feel most strongly about?

I want to feel safe, and free, and happy. I love my adopted city Chennai. I feel like it has a certain something, hard to put into words. The weather is terrible, and there are so many annoyances, but still, it has this character that I love - an unexpected congruence of the traditional and modern. I strongly feel that it has the potential to show the rest of the country, the world, how a metropolis ought to be. I want to make that happen - in my own small way - by ensuring that it is safe for all of us, to, say, enjoy a sweaty morning run in the semi-darkness of dawn, if we so wish, in various parts of this beautiful city.

Tell us about your activity and what you hope to do with it

First, a small group of us will conduct a Safety Audit in the area that we frequent a lot (Alwarpet), and populate the SafetiPin app with this information, from an early morning runner/walker perspective. Second, I have put together a small FB/Twitter campaign with the tag #RunSafe that will (hopefully!) get people talking about various issues they have faced in the past, and what solutions they think are possible. There are a handful of safety issues that are not exclusive to women, and a bit more to do with being on foot in roads that are increasingly taken over by vehicles, hopefully we will talk about that as well. Finally, I hope that towards the end of the campaign, there will be an opportunity to implement at least a few of the suggestions that emerge, and in addition to talking about it, demonstrate some action. 

Three things you would suggest to keep these individual actions going

I think involving the City administration in this activity is key, obviously. I am confident that they will be supportive.

I also feel that every institution could and should commit to examining their environs from a safety perspective, and individuals can champion this, perhaps as a New Year pledge.

Prajnya's first Women's Safety Audit

At a workshop organised by Jagori earlier this year, several organisations from across India learnt about Jagori's work on women's safety in public spaces in Delhi. A key objective of this workshop, which I attended, was to demonstrate the usefulness of the safety audit tool as a way to measure women's safety. Since then, we've been keen to pilot this in Chennai and decided to do so as part of this year's campaign.

Very simply, this is how a women's safety audit works:

You choose an area - either residential or a public space like a market or a mall or even a main road. A team of 5-6 members (primarily residents of that area) walk the area, looking to identify various factors that make it either safe or unsafe for women. This could include street lights, the presence/absence of hawkers/shops (who might respond if a woman needs help), pavements, empty lots with men hanging about, etc etc. In addition, the team also plots the area on a map, takes photos, videos and does spot interviews with people.

Moreover, one of the major objectives is to find ways to integrate issues of women's safety and sexual harassment into urban planning. This is why the walk actually looks at several aspects of urban infrastructure which are common to men and women - roads, lights, police support, etc etc. The idea is that if a city is safe for women, it is safe for everyone else too (including say, the disabled, for example). Equally, we believe that it is important to expand the idea of safety as something more than a law and order issue to include all these other factors.

We decided to audit a select area in Besant Nagar as a first step, for two reasons: the combination of a popular public space (the beach) and a residential area was particularly interesting and secondly, we identified an enthusiastic group, thanks to the enthusiastic involvement of Sharadha Shankar, a local resident of the area. Over the next few weeks, we identified the specific area we wanted to audit, revised the checklist shared by Jagori and explained the process to the team.

A report based on the preliminary findings is pasted below. Prajnya will now share the findings with relevant authorities and we also hope to expand the audit to other parts of the city.

Women’s Safety Audit, Besant Nagar

Preliminary Report

Who we are: A group of local residents living in the Besant Nagar area, along with a small team from Prajnya.

What we did: Undertook and carried out a women’s safety audit in select areas of Besant Nagar on Monday, 29 November 2010.

Why we did this: The safety audit is a tool used in several cities around the world to understand whether a particular area is safe for women. The audit helps local residents assess their own areas from the point of view of infrastructure, looking at roads and streets, lights, availability of public toilets, etc. The audit is based on the premise that a city safe for women is safe for everyone.

This area was chosen for a specific reason: it is a residential area but with a well-used and busy public place (the beach).

The area we covered: 5th Avenue, 32^nd, 33^rd and 34^th Cross Street, Besant Nagar.

What we found:

1. While the area is generally considered safe during the day, several of the inner streets are considered unsafe after dark, especially 32^nd Cross Street.
2. Lighting is a major concern:
1. The lights only come on at around 6pm, by which time it is already dark.
2. The only source of light, before the street lights come on, is from shops, who switch on their lights between 5.30pm and 5:45pm.
3. Several of the existing street lights do not function.
4. The light posts are so high up that they are hidden by the trees. Therefore the light is very dim.
3. There have been a few incidents of chain snatching, all targeting women, in recent months. These have taken place both at night and during the day.
4. Several of the footpaths are not accessible for the disabled or those with prams.
5. There is a run-down Electricity Board building behind the Metro Water complex. The windows are broken and residents report seeing men gather there, drinking and using the place as a toilet.
6. On the three inner lanes, despite several houses, there are few people on the road.
7. A section of the playground on 34^th Cross Street is cordoned off with tall aluminium sheets. There is virtually no lighting here, and this is a definite unsafe area.

What we recommend (based on our preliminary findings):

1. In ‘winter’ months, the lights need to come on earlier, at 5:30pm at least.
2. The existing street lights need to be fixed and new ones added on some of the inner lanes.
3. The height of the light posts could be lowered, so that they offer better light and are not blocked by the trees.
4. Something is done about the Electricity Board building: the windows are re-fixed, the building cordoned off or security appointed.

This audit was organised as part of the 2010 Prajnya 16 Days Campaign against Gender Violence.

A flood of news reports

I logged onto the NDTV website this evening, and in less than five minutes, I had spotted three different stories related to gender-based violence, in one way or the other.

At Ahmedabad's NID, nude man molests student

From Ahmedabad, the story of a student at the National Institute of Design (NID), who was assaulted by a naked man as she stepped out of her room onto the second floor corridor of the hostel, to get a glass of water from the cooler.

The last line of the news story: "There are about 250 girls in the NID who live in the college hostel. After sunset, now, they say they avoid leaving the hostel.

f

Read more at: http://www.ndtv.com/article/world/indian-american-indicted-for-groping-sleeping-woman-on-flight-61283?cp

Read more at: http://www.ndtv.com/article/cities/at-ahmedabads-nid-nude-man-molests-student-61415?cp

"

As we plan this year's campaign, we're doing a lot of reading and thinking about women's safety in public spaces, even in a city like Chennai that is considered relatively safe. From the stories we hear, this is clear: the burden is on women to protect themselves, and the easiest and often safest way to do this is to restrict their own movements. What does this say about their quality of life, if they cannot go down the road to buy a magazine or meet some friends for fear of being assaulted?

Indian American indicted for groping sleeping woman on flight

From the US, the story of a woman who was groped on a flight by a man sitting next to her. Again, whats striking is two things:
1. A case of sexual assault has been filed against the perpetrator. We know of many instances when similar incidents have been dismissed as trivial, and the woman is often told to just forget about it.
2. The incident took place on 28 September and less than a month later, charges have been framed and the case is in court.

I do not know enough about the US legal system to judge whether this is unusually quick or normal enough. But the fact is, if we could promise women speedy justice, without long-drawn out court appearances, I'm convinced that many more women would come forward to file charges against perpetrators of violence.

My grandmother wanted a boy: Saina Nehwal

And finally, back in India, Saina Nehwal talks about how her grandmother refused to look at her for a month after she was born - she was that disappointed that Saina wasn't a boy. Saina talks openly about how she has strained relations with her extended family who disagree with her parents on how women should be treated, and of how she hopes the wonderful performance of sportswomen from Haryana will have some effect on how families perceive the girl child.