Empowering Bengaluru's women to cycle safely

Women are now at the forefront pushing to make Bengaluru India’s first cycling-friendly city. To lay the groundwork for this mobility dream, an initiative called ‘Cycle School for Women’ has just been launched by Jhatkaa and Pedal in Tandem, a bicycle touring firm.

The initiative is in support of the #BengaluruMoving campaign, which seeks an overall reduction in vehicular emissions over the next few years. The campaign is being strategically rolled out in phases by different organisations on the ground and has used a range of creative tactics such as art, music, sports and tech to bring in more voices onboard.

The Cycle School for Women initiative was launched on Sunday as a series of beginner workshops to introduce women residents of Bengaluru to cycling. Over 50 women and girls signed up to attend this first event held last Sunday on Church Street.

The subsequent Cycle School workshops will be organised on Sundays at different locations in the city to teach women cycling if they do not already know how to.

In pursuit of cycling as a hobby/transport mode, women have faced infrastructural challenges, lack of knowledge about the right bicycle for different body types, appropriate clothing to wear and more. The workshops would address these concerns.

On the initiative, Pedal In Tandem founders Poojya Basavaraj and Dheeraj Subramanian observe: “There are several deterrents to people taking up cycling —lack of safety due to broken/pothole-ridden roads, motorists’ apathy and road rage towards cyclists, lack of separate cycling infrastructure (separate lanes and secure parking lots), lack of knowledge/self-reliance in case of breakdowns and lack of riding skills.”

For women, they say, these deterrents are compounded by existing safety concerns and social stigmas. “Through the Cycle School for Women initiative, we hope to break these barriers and enable more women to take up and continue cycling.”

Smitha Jacob, a fomer IT employee who participated in the Cycle School workshop, said: “Everyone used to tell me that I won’t be able to cycle, but I have done it. I didn’t think I could learn cycling today,
but I did it today for the first time!”