How Shakti scheme is shaping a new sense of self

Beyond the provision of free mobility to women, the scheme has spin-offs that encompass the collective good.

It was only when a 26-year-old Kuruba woman from Bagalkote replied, "I went to Bengaluru for a conference because the bus trip is free," that it dawned.

Public policies arise in response to stimuli. The inducement could be a public demand, like Kannada language in signage; a socio-economic issue, like low female labour force participation; an exigency, like open bore-wells; or an agenda for elections. No matter the impetus, policies are designed with deliberate objectives, target beneficiaries and expected outcomes.

The Shakti Yojane, emanating from an electoral promise of the current Congress government in Karnataka, entitles domiciled women to zero-fare tickets, i.e., the free use of ordinary public buses. Its objective, as stated by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, is that 'women of the state should not depend on anyone for education and employment-related journeys, should be fully involved in the public domain and lead a self-reliant life.' 

The scheme has been continuously operational since June 2023, and various studies on its impact have been undertaken. The mixed-methods study by Indus Action and Lokniti-CSDS is unique in that it provides a peep into the perceptions of beneficiaries and their ecosystems on the combinatorial effects of the five guarantees. The full study will be available in the public domain when the report is published, but some insights on Shakti, in particular, are captured below.

Findings reinforce that women in both the formal and informal labour force utilise and value access to free mobility. It facilitates women seeking work with higher pay and entrepreneurs seeking superior procurement and markets. It enables young women to aspire to educational prospects in dream colleges that may be farther away. It reduces commute expenses, and where buses and routes are favourable, women travel independently. Shakti is positively correlated with its stated objectives: access to education, employment, and self-reliance, leading to the greater presence of women in public.

Field inputs also echo its foibles that have surfaced during implementation. These are negative externalities, or undesirable and unintended side effects that impact a population besides the beneficiaries. They occur from consequences that were not anticipated during policy formulation. For instance, while Shakti has begotten a measurable swell in women's ridership to over 400 crore trips, it results in crowded buses and scarce seats. This affects both female and male commuters, although, by design, men are outside the scope of this policy. Simply put, Shakti was intended to improve women's mobility without degrading men's commute experiences, but it does. The solace, however, is that this has received spotlight focus, with the state Road Transport Corporations issuing directives to reserve half the seats for men. Shakti's cost to the public exchequer, on the other hand, cannot be classified as a negative externality. It was not uncovered ex post; instead, the policy was designed as a public good (with an exception for men) and meant to drive off public budget.

Beyond the attainments and detriments above, conversations with beneficiaries have unearthed Shakti's positive externalities, or spillover benefits. While the design of Shakti targets an individual woman's mobility, positive externalities include and transcend the individual herself to encompass collective good.

In one set of conversations in Shahbad, Kalaburgi, women spoke of being able to travel often to check on their children residing in hostels. Other young women spoke of using the free service to commute from home to remote work locations daily, instead of rooming in proximity to work to save on expenses. Elderly women rejoiced that their newfound wheels carried them as they wished, to the homes of their married sons and daughters. Women spoke of being able to prioritise more social events like anniversaries or festivals for joint celebrations and schedule outings as larger family groups. These conversations illuminated a pattern of leveraging Shakti for tightening family bonds. This is a derivate that policy makers did not envision: free mobility as a catalyst of filial kinship.

In Bagalkote and Dakshina Kannada, there were stories of women collaborating with each other for weekend plans. They would work around their household obligations to schedule overlapping windows for leisure travel with friends from their self-help groups or neighbourhoods. They travelled together for mundane household purchases at bigger marketplaces, sightseeing trips or temple runs.

Friendship is starved without time spent together to accumulate a variety of life experiences, and adult women's lives seldom make room for it. Shakti provides that space for groups of women to rub elbows. While the trips themselves have come to light even earlier, women acknowledging the cultivation of friendships is heartwarming.

Conversations with daily wage earners in Bengaluru presented another fascinating by-product. They were able to attend union meetings, thanks to free travel. Women in Tumakuru went to trainings and conferences. Some even reported going to Freedom Park to protest for higher wages. Such usages attest to mobility not only as a factor but a precondition for women's participation in public affairs.

On the other side of the aisle, men had divided opinions about the scheme. Some appreciated the empowerment, while others begrudged it. The refrain that women were ‘roaming around unnecessarily’, ‘leaving homes and husbands behind to visit temples’, or ‘travelling without purpose’ was laced with judgement, sexism and a dose of Gen Z-like FOMO. The irony of such comments – emanating from men banded around coffee shops, cigarette kiosks and splayed out in parks – was hard to miss.

Meanwhile, it is useful to remind ourselves of Rawls's Theory of Justice. The 'original position' of the woman in this thought experiment is one of zero or low mobility and zero or low earned income. She does not own a vehicle, and her work is largely home, kitchen, children, and family bound. This is not a hypothetical; as of 2022-23, only 12.5% of all licences in Karnataka were issued to women. That makes nearly 90% of women dependent on their own two feet or others for mobility. This starting position circumscribes the woman's external activity. Even as a full-grown adult, she is dependent on another to sponsor bus fares or for a lift and hence must explain or justify travel. This is both a limiting and degrading experience as an adult.

Numbers from the Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation bear this out. Occupancy ratios have inverted from 35 per cent-40 per cent female and 60-65% male before Shakti to 63 per cent female and 37 per cent male on average after. This emphatically demonstrates that women were en bloc under-serviced. Shakti has unleashed this pent-up demand, and not even in full measure, due to the under-supply of buses.

The traditional, gender-blind view of free mobility from state and non-state actors, including activists, non-profits and domain experts, is utilitarian. It analyses the salutary effects of free mobility on economy, emissions and easing of traffic, and accordingly, appeals to governments to invest in buses to relieve congestion, restore the environment and increase labour availability and productivity. Similar is a focus on utilitarian challenges, viz., costs, crowds, and corruption.

While these arguments have some merit, they have failed to accelerate investments in buses, even with a Union government push for electric mobility. In reality, the bus fleet has plateaued in the last decade, although Bengaluru's population has grown by 60 lakhs and Karnataka's by over 1.2 crores in that period. What has propelled change is the demand spike due to the rush of women availing themselves of free mobility. It has flipped the state over the edge, for the first time ever, into seeking funding for over fourteen thousand buses. If, indeed, this is approved by the Union government, it would be the mother of all positive externalities of Shakti – a boon for the state at large.

For women, free mobility on the public bus has awakened them to individual travel, independent travel, leisure travel and travel as a sorority. It has boosted their social presence and public participation. It has allowed ordinary women an extraordinary recognition of themselves as individuals and citizens.

As one woman remarked, 'While no one would notice us before, now, suddenly, we are visible.' This discerning comment captures the nub of mobility itself. It is quintessentially gendered, and when free, a turnstile for women's self-actualisation. In effect, Shakti makes it okay for women to live a little!

(The writer is a senior advisor at Lokniti-CSDS, facilitating a quantitative study of the five Guarantees)