Public transport like buses and trains in India have women-only coaches and seats to protect women from male violence. Women in the city I am in rely on these women-only compartments to be able to earn their living and exercise their basic rights of movement and personal liberty.

On an evening in 2017 I was travelling back home and it was fairly crowded, though not too much. I saw a man dressed in a salwar-kameez (common attire for Indian women) talking on the phone in the women-only compartment. He carried himself in an effeminate manner, e.g. long hair, purse, make-up (don't remember exactly). I felt a bit uncomfortable with him present in the women-only compartment. I noticed that other women around me would look at him, for like a second, and then just look away - mainly, we all minded our business while this man in a dress was going on about the rights of trans-identified people, on the phone.

This happened before I became a TERF. Before I even knew what "gender identity" meant. And yet this incident has been in my memory - I was uncomfortable with his presence in a women-only space. So I guess the erosion of and intrusion across women's boundaries in the Global South has already begun, thanks to genderists and their cronies here in India.

#india #trains #publictransport #safespaces #womenonly #maleviolence #freedomofmovement #singlesexspaces #selfID