Ahmedabad: A Telangana-based NGO, Moving Women, has organized a motorcycle expedition that will cover nearly the entire nation’s borders.
The tour is aimed at raising awareness about gender inclusion in sustainable mobility. Moving Women founder Jai Bharathi started off from Hyderabad and has travelled through Chennai, Cochin, Goa, Pune, Mumbai, Surat and Statue of Unity on the expedition, called ‘Moving Boundaries Tour’. She was in Ahmedabad on Tuesday on the way to her next leg of the tour. She said she met a lot of women drivers on the journey thus far, some of whose experiences were very inspirational.
Bharathi said, “Today, I met
a handicapped woman driving a scooter-sidecar in a mall. She was very confident about driving despite the handicap and said she goes
to any place in Ahmedabad she wishes to without depending on anybody for travel. I found that quite inspiring.”
The boundary tour is supported by Shell Foundation and FDCO (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office of UK government). They have supported the Moving Women’s campaign because the group itself has also been trying to make the mobility sector accessible to more women. It has plans to assemble a consortium of organisations working towards enabling women in mobility.
Bharathi said her experience in Chennai stood out most in the entire campaign. The city has over 200 women auto-rickshaw drivers. These women changed roles during the pandemic to become Covid ambulance drivers with a month’s training of driving bigger vehicles. Some now drive other vehicles, from electric vehicles to large forklifts.
Moving Women was started in Hyderabad in 2019 and has trained more than 1,500 women, especially from the lower income groups and self-help groups, to start their own small microbusiness.
