Gender Equality India Project #16908

Help Women in India Become Professional Drivers

by Azad Foundation

Help Women in India Become Professional Drivers

Project Report | Nov 2, 2018
Little drops of water, make the mighty ocean

By Astha Pando | Project Leader

FLP Leader with the women in a commuity

Little drops of water, make the mighty ocean

Back in 2008, when Azad began its journey, ‘professional women chauffeur’ was not even a word that existed in India. There were no discussions around such concept. Over the last 10 years, with your support, Azad has been able to pioneer this innovative and “disruptive” concept and establish its viability irrefutably. Despite all the challenges faced by women, professional women chauffeurs have now become a familiar sight. All thanks to you – your continuous support for the Women on Wheels program allowed us to reach out and train thousands of resource poor women and their community members and begin the chain of change.

As the organization completes its 10 years of journey of empowering women as professional women chauffeurs, we are delighted to share with you our achievements from last year of 2017/18. Here are a few snapshots of some of the work done by Azad from our latest annual report:

Through Azad’s community mobilization program, 527 women were supported in numerous ways to join our Women on Wheels program.
Enrolling a total of 693 women into the women on wheels program who undertake their journey towards empowerment and freedom.
397 of the enrolled trainees acquired permanent license and can now earn their livelihoods with dignity. There has been a 23% increase in the number of women who became employable as compared to 2016-17.
147 more trained women drivers joined the pool of 650+ professional chauffeurs already earning remunerative salaries and claiming a space of their own in the transport sector.
35 Parvaz Feminist Leaders reached out to 18,333 people – including women interested to join Women on Wheels, helping them with accessing citizenship documents, healthcare services, accessing social security schemes, training on self-defense and etc.
A total of 162 young men became part of the change process through the Men for Gender Justice program that aims to build an enabling ecosystem for the women to access non-traditional livelihood options.
1350 school going adolescent girls in 10 schools in Jaipur received training based on ‘self’, gender, sexual and reproductive health and non-traditional livelihood options, which helps them make informed choices about their future lives and broaden their horizons.
We’ve expanded the scope of Women on Wheels program to 2 new centers based in Delhi and Kolkata,. Azad conducted a study on ‘Financing Options for Skills for Work of Marginalized women’ in collaboration with the Asia South Pacific Association for Basic and Adult Education (ASBAE) looking at the policy recommendations, governance and financing options required to provide skills development for decent work and economic and social wellbeing to the marginalized women, using the case studies of India and Indonesia.24 young people volunteered at Azad centers giving 750 hours of their time to help create a more equal world for women.

You can read more in our Annual Report 2017-18: http://azadfoundation.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Azad-Foundation-Annual-Report-OFFSET-PRINT-01.pdf.

Here are some glimpses of the change that occurred in the lives of the women and men that Azad works with:

“Today my identity has changed and I am regarded with respect by everyone. When I go to the airport, either to pick or drop my clients in my Mercedes, even the airport staff looks at me with a sense of awe and respect. It makes me feel so proud.”- Ritu, Driving the wheels of change in her Mercedes as a chauffeur at Marriot, Indore

“Since I have started working with the Maruti Driving School, not only have I become self-dependent and capable of taking my own decisions, the training has also brought about an immense shift in my personality, giving me the confidence to become a professional.” – Jigna , training women as drivers at Maruti Driving School, Ahmedabad

‘Nagma - Parvaz Feminist Leader from Seelampuri discovered that women in her community do not have Aadhar cards. She took it on herself to get their documents made. The Tehsildar (Officer in-charge) was skeptical of her efforts but she did not give up. Nagma managed to reserve 15 tokens per day for her to be able to help women attain or update their documents.’

“I understand that everyone, be it female, male or even transgender has rights and we can’t ignore them and deny them their rights just in the name of culture and tradition.” – Vikrant, participant of the Men for ender Justice Programme, Delhi

“Now we can change bulbs at home! We sometimes even change the lights in school if they are not working.” – Azad Kishori Trainee Seema, Jaipur

This is just a glimpse of the impact your contribution to the Women on Wheels program has created. We are very grateful for your support and for having faith in the women we work with. Thank you for being our companion in the journey of empowering women and giving them the key to their lives.

Ritu - Samaan

Men for Gender Justice during a triaing

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Aug 2, 2018
Women on Wheels give wings to their dreams

By Astha Pando | Project Leader

Sonali with her cab

Your constant support has been our biggest strength in reaching out to resource poor women and providing them with livelihoods with dignity. Under the Women on Wheels program, we have been expanding our reach and partnering with new organisations to enable women to access non-Traditional livelihood options, particularly driving.

Back in October 2016, we joined hands with Samaan Social Development Society to bring Women on Wheels program to women in Indore. Samaan is a word used for ’Equality’ in Hindi. Samaan actively makes the legal justice accessible to the women suffering from violence through their program called Kanooni Sakhi. After partnership with Azad Foundation they have been able to expand their work in slums from 5 to 100 slum communities and started providing women with non-traditional livelihood opportunities like driving where they can work and become socially and economically empowered.

Azad Foundation provided various capacity building sessions to Samaan to implement the Women on Wheels program. Azad has constantly been supporting Samaan and sharing their own field experience to help them achieve their goals in bringing about greater gender equality.

To date, Samaan has enrolled 85 resource poor women. 68 women have received their Permanent License and 10 are already employed. These women gained work with reputed organisations like Municipal Corporation of Indore (a govt. body) and Marriot Hotel.

All these women have been through a thorough training comprising technical modules like learner’s license module, driving on road, map reading and first aid. Non-technical modules consisted of Communication, Map reading, First Aid, English, and Gender, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Legal Rights.

Samaan has recently taken a step forward and started a program called Mahila (Women) Mechanic. The trainees will go through a 3-month training of repairing mechanical aspects of two-wheelers. So far, 30 women have been enrolled for this program since its inception in May 2018.

One of the courageous women who undergone Women on Wheels training is Sonali. Here is her story…

Rising from the ashes like a phoenix

Sonali is now known as Driver Madame. After driving training in the Women's Wheels program this year, she runs the Indoor Girls 'Hostels' car. Sonali’s life has changed in so many ways. She shares about her struggles in life starting from childhood to moving away from her in-law’s house because of the violence that she faced.

'My father used to fight with my mother and left us when I was young. My mother got married to another man and we stayed with our grandmother. My father married other woman who didn’t have a child and so he came and took us with him. My stepmother treated us badly. I wasn’t allowed to go to school.

I was married off at the age of 15. My husband had studied only till 8th and didn’t work. He would fight and beat me every day. I came back home but my father took me back to my in-laws where my husband beat me up brutally once again. I went back to my family, which eventually agreed to let me stay with them. I filed a divorce case against my husband, which is still in process.

I had lost hope. But then one day I got to know about the driving training from a friend. I saw some hope for better life and I joined the training. Legal training gave me lot of strength. I understood that it is only me who can control my life. I met women who were facing troubles in life and together we shared our problems. I felt like I am not alone.

I had never ridden a bicycle before, therefore I was afraid as to how I would drive a car but I didn’t give up. With support from Samaan, I finally succeeded.

Today I am driver and earning for myself. This is like receiving a new life altogether.

My whole life has changed. I drive a girls' hostel car, picking up and dropping off girls. They feel very safe with me. These girls say that I have done something different. Their words make my identity and I feel proud. Today I know every route of Indore city. I have become fearless and even more confident.'

Thank you for giving wings to the dreams of these women! We appreciate your constant support and encouragement.

Nothing can stop me

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May 3, 2018
They couldn't do it without you

By Veronika | Project Leader

The first batch of WOW trainees in north Kolkata

Your incredible support and encouragement is helping bring livelihoods with dignity to underprivileged women in new places!

In December 2017, we opened a new training centre for the Women on Wheels programme in north Kolkata. For the past three years, we have already been working in south part of Kolkata, where we enrolled over 185 resource-poor women for the WOW programme. To date, 79 of them have become employable as chauffeurs.

But thanks to this new centre in the north, we will be able to reach out to new areas of the city and provide livelihoods in professional driving to many more women.

The centre is located at Vivekananda Road, and is close to many slum areas as well as affluent areas, which offer good employment opportunities for the trained women drivers.

This year, we are planning to enrol 45 women for the Women on Wheels programme in the new centre.

Over the last months, we have started working in the slums, building contacts and connections with the local communities. We have been spreading information about Women on Wheels programme and importance of non-traditional livelihoods for women. We have covered 12 slums in 4 wards of the area and reached over 1,109 women with direct outreach activities, such as household survey, community meeting and leafleting. We have also conducted a range of mass outreach activities, such as auto campaigns and theatre and dance performances as part of One Billion Rising against Violence on Women campaign.

As a result, the first group of 8 women have already commenced Women on Wheels training in the new centre. Most of them have already acquired learner’s driving license and are now learning driving at Khanna Motor Training School, as they also undertake self-development and empowerment modules.

What does it mean for a woman to join Women on Wheels?

So many things…here is a story of Sunanda from Kolkata that says it all.

Sunanda has been married of early, her father forcefully married her when she was just 14. The day she got married, she passed class 8 in her school, but because of the marriage, she could not get admitted for class 9. After three years of being married, she gave birth to her daughter.

Sunanda faced severe physical and mental violence by her husband. She believed that as a married woman she must accept tortures by her husband. But when her daughter was 2 years old, she decided not to continue tolerating such torture and told her mother about it. Her mother brought her back home.

Sunanda’s mother is a domestic worker and the only earning member in their family, as their father left them. Sunanda’s brother is still in school and they all live in a rented house in a slum. After Sunanda returned to her mother’s place, she wanted to start working, but did not want to work as domestic worker like her mother. She wanted to do a beautician course, but they required the class 10th pass certificate to enter the course. Then, one day, she learnt about WoW programme and thinking about the future of her daughter, she decided to join.

She says: ‘I have found a light in my life after joining Azad.’

‘Despite other job opportunities coming my way, I am determined to become professional driver. Since starting the Women on Wheels training, I have lost my fear of going to new places and talking to strangers.’

Sunanda’s mother supports her a lot, though sometimes she worries about her daughter choosing such non-traditional profession. But Sunanda is determined to become professional driver and make a bright future of her daughter.

Thank YOU for standing by women like Sunanda. Thank YOU for helping us to enable more women to embark on a journey of transformation and towards a more dignified life.

We couldn’t do it without you. They couldn’t do it without you.

Sunanda at Azad's centre

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