New Delhi: On the morning of February 22, when a MiG-21 Bison fighter jet took off from Indian Air Force (IAF) Station in Jamnagar, Gujarat, it seemed like routine training undertaken everyday. But it broke many barriers and created history. In the cockpit was Flying Officer Avani Chaturvedi, 24, the first Indian woman to fly solo sortie on a fighter aircraft.
Asked what was going through her mind as she flew the jet to 700km/h for 30 minutes, Chaturvedi is reported to have said, “When we sit in the cockpit and close the canopy, any feelings of achievement, empowerment and so on are left on the ground. We don’t carry them in the air. The aircraft is so fast and the reaction time for any situation is so little that we don’t have time to think about anything else.”
- Avani Chaturvedi | IAF flying officer
Chaturvedi was among the first-ever batch of three women pilots, including Bhavna Kanth and Mohana Singh, who were inducted into IAFs fighter squadron in July 2016. They had volunteered as the IAF regulations required. The evaluation of their physical and mental aptitude, which the force insists had been gender neutral, found them fit.
(Women were allowed to join the armed forces outside the medical stream for the first time in 1992. Though they began flying helicopters and transport aircraft since, they were ruled out for combat operations. In 2015, the government opened up the fighter stream for women. This allowed the three women to complete their advanced training and be able to fly jets like Sukhoi and Tejas, which until then were flown only by men officers).
Setting benchmarks
While women’s entry into combat roles is new, hundreds of them have been flying commercial planes for decades. However, Durba Banerjee was the first woman pilot of Indian Airlines (now Air India) in 1956. In 2016, Kshamata Bajpayee, who has been flying Air India planes since 1997, became the first captain to command an aircraft with an all-women crew on the longest direct flight from New Delhi to San Francisco.
While commercial aviation is witnessing a boom with more women striving to become a part of the airline industry, women have made strides in varied fields that are still largely perceived as a male domain.
Sunita Chaudhary, auto driver
In 2003, another male bastion was conquered when Sunita Chaudhary created history by becoming the first woman auto driver in Delhi. She still remains the only one in the city. After two years of haggling with authorities, who refused her licence on grounds of gender, Chaudhary threatened them with approaching the high court to fight for her rights.
She says: “A staffer had thrown application papers on my face saying no woman had ever been issued batch and driving licence in the past. But finally, they had to give in. I still value everything, because it all came after a long struggle.” Hailing from Mawana, Meerut district in Uttar Pradesh, Chaudhary says people are still not used to the idea of a woman being an auto driver.
Laxmi Lakra, train driver:
Laxmi Lakra was 27 when she brought laurels for her village Salgi, district Lohardaga in Jharkhand. In 2008, she became the first woman loco-pilot (train driver) with the Northern Railways. Her father, a construction worker, saved every penny and moved to Ranchi, Bihar, to provide good education to his daughter.
Having often travelled alone by train, Lakra says, “I wondered how drivers handled and manoeuvred trains. When I found women were eligible for the Railway Recruitment Board exams, I immediately applied and cleared the test. I was the only woman in my batch of 372 trainees.” While initially, her batch mates made fun; they grudgingly accepted her when she outshone them by scoring better. “Such things do not bother me, as I know I am on the right track,” she quips.
Vankudothu Saritha, bus driver:
In 2015, Vankudothu Saritha, 33, drove her way to history by becoming the first woman to hit Delhi roads as a bus driver. The Grade 10 pass woman from Telangana had re-written the history of Delhi Transport Corporation, which had over 200 women bus conductors, but no woman driver.
She said, “I had a High Motor Vehicle license since 2008, but out of a dozen women applicants, only I could clear all tests and was trained according to the corporation’s module. But three years later, I feel quite stressed due to long hours of driving and unruly passengers. It is difficult to focus on the road when men try touching me or take photos.”
Saritha remains the only woman bus driver in the city.
Yogita Raghuvanshi, truck driver:
The Bhopal-based mother of two grown up children drives a ten-wheeler across states with confidence. Tragedy struck 48-year-old Yogita Raghuvanshi, a housewife with a law degree, fifteen years ago when her husband, who ran a transport business, died in a road accident.
Raghuvanshi worked as a legal assistant along with hiring a driver to continue running her husband’s business. She recalls, “Within six months the driver ran away abandoning the truck in Hyderabad. Leaving my young children behind, I went there with a mechanic and got the vehicle repaired in four days. On my journey back, I had decided to learn driving and got my license.”
She has steered her truck across Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra.
Sarita Dixit, taxi driver:
She has been driving a taxi for the past six years. Delhi-based Sarita Dixit, 25, was in Grade 12 when she had to quit studies, as her father, a bus driver, met with an accident. Initially, she took private tuitions for children, but finding it difficult to run the house with a meagre income, she approached an NGO and learnt to drive.
Dixit says, “I would have opted for law studies, but fate willed it otherwise. Driving a taxi is known the world over as a male-dominated profession and an unconventional career choice for a woman, but then, it’s a well-paying job. Out of curiosity, many people converse with me when I am ferrying them. However, most are respectable towards me and that keeps me going.”
