Women on guard

The research institute I visit on occasion is a massive structure. Its wings stretch out in long corridors to accommodate the rooms after rooms required for research, replete with state-of-the-art machinery each priced at lakhs, if not crores of rupees. At the entrance to the premises a bunch of uniformed sentinels are constantly present. They are the undifferentiated security buffer to the outside world, and few know them as individuals.

The institution was born decades ago, when a small group of doctors mooted the idea of ongoing research and development. The founders had to fund the projects themselves, initially. Today it has grown prestigious, and money is no longer an object. The institution is showered with scholarships, fellowships and grants. New sections are added or renovated at will. But rather like within a beehive, roles are preordained. The building buzzes with activity with hundreds of personnel. Scientists and research scholars scurry about in their lab coats and latex gloves, focused unwaveringly on making new discoveries. Each such member hardly has the time to look around at their surroundings, much less to interact with people unrelated to their technical universe.

The security staff is meant to facilitate the institutional preoccupations, to ensure the safety of the institutional members and their magic machines. A small security complex is built right beside the gates. It has a tiny office for the security supervisor, a chair or two to rest on by turns and little else in terms of facilities. The security cell is not air-conditioned, and one large standing fan is in operation at the height of summer. Ineffectual at keeping out the heat beating down on the low roof of the structure, it serves to merely move the hot air around.

I notice a woman there on guard duty. She is tall, of athletic build, attractive and still young. She looks smart in her uniform of shirt with epaulets and security insignia and starched white sari. Her employment is probably a result of the increasing percentage of women being employed. Yes, she nods; her duty is to interact with the women, so that they do not face handling by men. Since she is the only female in the cell, her services are invaluable. During conventions and other important meets she must be in attendance for all the lady visitors. That means, rain, hail, shine or personal illness, she cannot be absent.

We spend a few moments in girly conversation, about fashion accessories that I might wear but she is not allowed to by the regulations. There does not seem to be any separate facility either for her as a woman although she has been at work for a couple of years. I ask why she took this job. She has a ready smile and pleasant manner. Surely there are other avenues of front-office employment open? She gets many offers, pips up one of her colleagues, but she does not take them up. Everybody wants her and nobody here will let her go. I smile at the extravagant words. The woman blushes pink and shushes him.

She tells me she comes from a police family. Father, brother and sister, are all in the force. That was the life she had wanted too. Her application was being processed, but then marriage happened, and the regulations immediately rendered her ineligible. The touch of vermillion in her hair signals her marital status. I ask how she balances between her work and her home. She looks away momentarily, and shakes her head. Her child is being raised by the extended family, and she barely gets to see them. The job demands her time and all she can do for family is pay the costs. The emotional conflict is tangible.

Walking out from the institution, I spot a policewoman at work on the street. She is on traffic duty dressed in the khaki service shirt of the police force and sari, though, as she tells me later, they must wear trousers too. I stop by the side of the road. She motions me to stand near her as she waves her arms to regulate pedestrian crossings. I shake my head and say I stopped to see her. She looks a little perplexed. I suppose she too is used to being seen as a role rather than a person. She is middle-aged, looks drawn and seems to favour a limp. She is unsmiling, her tone strident as if used to encountering intransigence. And, true to “regulations”, she has never married. She tells me she has been ill for some days, but her leave application was not sanctioned.

It is her duty to serve. I watch her tackle jaywalkers. See, she says, as she points to offenders that can see the lights are green for traffic, yet run across dodging the oncoming vehicles. She stops several and gives them a stern talking to, but the habit is ingrained. It seems a thankless job to speak about public safety because the people she stops argue in return. Unfortunately, she is powerless to issue deterrents like spot fines. She threatens that should an accident occur, she will not book the driver, because it would be the victim’s own fault for getting in the way. 

I wonder how long she has been a traffic cop. She says she is not. She has thirty-one years of police service but the assignment here is only for the day because of shortage of women personnel.  Their job is to follow the orders that come and she was told to report here only two hours before. Earlier, she was engaged in crowd control at the sports stadium. I ask her why she chose the force. What jobs are there for us, she counters, thousands are trying to get this one now. She looks around her, comments that the streetlights are inadequate for such a busy intersection and then limps away to stop a few more defaulters.

I am surprised that to this day and age in India, the archaic service conditions for women carry forward unquestioned. It seems the men in any organization may have family but women in uniform must sacrifice for service. Not all women though - I remember a high-profile female police commissioner portrayed in the media as the ideal, efficiently managing both work and family, so there must be regulations and regulations. Equality, it seems, is for men or else, for those at the top of the heap. Why so? The obvious issue is biological – the bearing and rearing of children. Those remain the woman’s personal works in this region, while elsewhere in the world, campaigns run for paternity benefits!

Under these regulations, the discrimination of gender and class in bureaucratic employment continue, leaving many of these women vulnerable, open to exploitation. It is hard for those ensconced in ivory towers to think beyond themselves. Their tunneled vision of the world makes social conversations with others difficult, or even to relate to them as people. I called on the institutional director some years ago, to suggest people development programmes with personnel across levels. In my perception, many could do with some training of social skills, understanding the reality of others through feedback, especially of those below them in the hierarchy. The man sitting in the plush chair, dwarfed by the massive desk and protective detail, was incensed by the implication. We are an HRD institution, he shouted, it is our job to teach! 

Women are comparatively new to employment and work conditions. Guard duty, for instance, is not a common choice of work for women brought up with marriage as their goal. They seek employment for economic needs. But when required to sacrifice home-life for work-life, they are being force to pay a price for being women. Social activism attacks poverty or corruption, but there seems none to fight for the rights of women putting life and limb on the line to keep others safe. Their work conditions are pathetic, and urgently require revision. It is more than time to address the pervading standard received wisdom of keeping them disadvantaged. The powers-that-be of institutions need to learn a little empathy, a little humility before they teach.