[vigsom]

After Asia's first lady bus driver, M Vasanthakumari, who joined TNSTC (Tamilnadu State Transport Corporation) in the 90s, and retired in 2017, the state is seeing a new face - 24 year old Sharmila, a Diploma in Pharmacy, who is now piloting a private service city bus in Coimbatore. Lady bus drivers are already in service or being onboarded in West Bengal, DTC, MSRTC, J&K RTC, HRTC, UPSRTC to name a few.

Sharmila's story, as reported, is one of realizing dreams and breaking barriers. Her father, Mahesh, who drives an autorickshaw, inducted Sharmila to autorickshaws post which she drove "load" or cargo light commercial vehicles, and then aimed, trained for and got her certification for heavy vehicles. A private bus operator, VV, operating route 20A from Gandhipuram to Somanur in Coimbatore gave her the opportunity to pilot the private bus. Another private operator there has also offered to take her on as a driver. Here are some related videos, all in Tamil, but one can easily understand the story by just viewing these.

https://youtu.be/NjAKvuiRtRo

https://youtu.be/RpbaxjoTI3M

https://youtu.be/DKE_tPqMKS8

PS: I'm in no way affiliated to any of these channels or those featured here.

[Aditya]

Thread moved out from the Assembly Line. Thanks for sharing!

[vharihar]

Why is she driving barefeet? I can't understand how some people prefer driving barefeet. My (late) cousin used to do that too.

I feel the foot would rest on the pedal more stably (ie. in a more stable manner) if a shoe or sandal was worn.

[V.Narayan]

Thank you for sharing this important piece of news on the yet another green shoot of vital social change driven at the grass roots. My very best wishes and prayers to this young courageous lady for her success.

What follows now is my philosophy, based on my experiences, others might vehemently disagree. --> Nature has made men and women to be complimentary to each other in the emotional, social, mental, attributes each brings to the table. Of course, each of us individually also carry within ourselves some mixture of male and female qualities both the harmonious and the toxic.

By excluding one half of the vast basket of human attributes & aptitudes and restricting them from work outside the home and the fields {other than manual labour} society made itself poorer. It truly warms my heart to see women as pilots, Army Colonels, bus drivers, IAS officers, et al. Women in India have a long way to go, no doubt as the India sucks brigade on the forum will remind us. But let's celebrate our green shoots for these are the first steps of that thousand mile journey.

Speaking with facts from my old business line, another mode of transportation, India today has more commercial pilots at work in both absolute numbers and as a percentage than any other country including the Scandinavian ones. India has more pilots in the Air Force, Navy, Army as a number {I don't have data on percentages} than any other Armed Force outside the US Air Force {China might be an exception, but no reliable data is available}.

When I started my career, at least in India women executives in the C suite were almost completely absent. It was assumed, even by liberals like me, to be the natural order of things. Today things are different, not enough but still noticeably different largely for the better. When I first joined Boards of large companies about two plus decades ago there were simply no women directors. Period. To be honest we didn't think them necessary either. Women started joining Boards in numbers only after the law changed with the 2013 Companies Act. And we had to reluctantly hunt for women remotely senior and experienced enough to bring on Boards. On Boards I served/ still serve we typically sought the few senior professional women who were all typically 55+ back in 2014 and discovered with time that the best women to bring on board are the ones in their 40s for they are the new generation with a whole new aura of confidence and approach and are more well read! - and don't hesitate to take on old buzzards like me.

In conclusion I'll add, for all their faults, women don't do things like attack Ukraine, conquer Iraq, commit genocide in East Pakistan!!

[Vasuki]

Similar women drivers are here in Kerala too.

The interesting part is that, they are highly educated.

In the city of Kollam

Kollam

At Kochi

Kochi

[DicKy]

Originally Posted by vigsom

After Asia's first lady bus driver, M Vasanthakumari, who joined TNSTC (Tamilnadu State Transport Corporation) in the 90s, and retired in 2017,

I have seen a lady bus driver driving in the Nagercoil- Thiruvananthapuram route a couple of times, so was curious to who this Chennai based first lady driver was. . It is the same person. Didn't know that she joined in the 90s itself, nor her retiring in 2017.

[jeeva]

Originally Posted by vharihar

Why is she driving barefeet? I can't understand how some people prefer driving barefeet. My (late) cousin used to do that too.

I used to drive barefoot so that I could articulate the throttle, brakes, and clutch better in the hills, where there were no roads. When it rained, it used to be a slush field. With the old Mahindra 4x4s, you really needed to have the knack to not get stuck. Things have changed, now but even now you see truck, bus, local jeep and tractor drivers driving barefoot.

[adwaith]

Fantastic news. I wish they had women drivers and conductors for all the pink buses here. If the buses are free to empower women, we mustn't give up opportunity to grant them government employment as well.

[RRM]

Kudos!
Days are not far when we will see ladies (in pair) piloting Volvo/Scania on long routes. if they can scale Leyland and tata steering, Volvo etc. will be cake walk

[Pennant1970]

Originally Posted by vharihar

Why is she driving barefeet? I can't understand how some people prefer driving barefeet. My (late) cousin used to do that too.

I like to drive with my right foot bare. It has helped me over the years to sense the revs through the feet and change gears better. Nowadays, as I lose some frequencies of the sound spectrum to hereditary age-related hearing loss, I find it even more helpful. Also, I find my foot is more stable unshod than with footwear.

A few weeks back, Alex of "Auto Alex" and "Car Throttle" channels on YouTube did a semi-serious experiment where he found barefeet driving was best! [Please note that this is no serious evidence based study. You will get the idea if you follow these channels.]

[rajeevsulu]

Kudos to her and may more women be empowered! On the aspect of barefoot driving, I have seen many people including my grandfather follow this technique. They always claimed better feel! I never tried it though!

[discoverwild]

Originally Posted by vharihar

Why is she driving barefeet? I can't understand how some people prefer driving barefeet. My (late) cousin used to do that too.

I feel the foot would rest on the pedal more stably (ie. in a more stable manner) if a shoe or sandal was worn.

I prefer driving barefoot too. I need to just use the big toe for the accelerator and shift the toe end keeping the heel in the same place to hit the brakes.

While driving a bus might be different, the bare foot allows for more feedback to reach you from the pedals. In 32 years of driving over 12L kms, most of it has been this way.

Soiled wet shoes or slippers or sandals are dangerous to drive in.

[Gansan]

India has the largest proportion of lady airline pilots at ~ 13%, while in the rest of the world it is around 5%. There are quite a few lady loco pilots. I have seen quite a few lady auto drivers too. So it is only fair they should get jobs driving all forms of transport.