She drives her way to masses

Lone woman auto driver in Delhi to contest LS polls

 Autorickshaw drivers in Delhi, like elsewhere in the country, are known for their notoriety. Reckless driving, picking up quarrels with passengers and charging exorbitantly are common scenes on the streets of the national capital. So also are the complaints by hassled passengers against auto drivers.

Amidst them is a lone woman driver of the three- wheeler who is hogging the limelight, not just because she is from the fairer sex but because of her ambition to become a lawmaker.

Sunita Chaudhury is the only woman auto driver in Delhi to contest the Lok Sabha elections from the New Delhi constituency. She has been put up by the NGO, United Women’s Front, run by Suman, wife of late vice president Krishan Kant.

Promising to make education, electricity and water free to the poor, 33-year old Chaudhury drives her green-and-yellow-metered auto through the lanes and by-lanes of Delhi, seeking votes. She claims to have undertaken social service like picking up accident victims from the Delhi roads whenever she comes across them and rushing them to the hospital. “Whoever travelled in my auto will remember me as I always behave politely,” she told Deccan Herald.

The illiterate Chaudhury first entered the electoral fray in the last Delhi Assembly polls for the Mehrauli segment representing the Panthers Party, but lost her deposit.

Pitted against big guns like Union Minister of State for Urban Development Ajay Maken of the Congress and the BJP’s Vijay Goel, she says: “Election is not about winning alone. But I can spread some message about women’s rights.” A victim of child marriage, she said she ran away from her native Meerut in the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh at the age of 14, and worked in hospitals and was associated with an NGO in Delhi. Subsequently she got driving training and received licence to ply auto.

“I never visited my native place and lost links with my family,” she said, adding that now Delhi was her home. She admits plying auto is not easy especially for women. “But I have been driving for the past five years without any hassles as I am courageous,” she says.