Sky is not the limit for gender bias

As an Indian airline pays `50,000 for refusing a drink to a Canadian flier because she’s a ‘woman’, we spoke to other foreign girls who gave up alcohol, short skirts and partying to live in Delhi If you’re a woman living in India, irrespective of what your nationality is, chances are that gender discrimination would be among the grouses you’ll have with your life in the capital. A Canadian woman working in India faced a similar situation while on a Delhi-bound Jet Airways India Limited flight recently, when she was denied a drink by a male steward. Apparently, upon asking for a glass of rum, she was told that being a woman, she couldn’t have an alcoholic drink. So, she filed a complaint with a district consumer disputes redressal forum, which has now asked the airline to pay her `50,000, and reportedly “advised the company to train its staff on etiquette... without any discrimination on the basis of gender and nationality”. While the Canadian woman chose to fight the discrimination, not every woman with a foreign passport in the capital chooses to take that route. When we spoke to foreign women living in India, most of them said that they’ve learnt to live around the bias, instead of choosing to fight it everyday. Amelia* (24) had a tough time getting an accommodation in Delhi University when she was there for a few months in 2009. Since she was accompanied by her boyfriend and they were looking for a joint accommodation, she was often turned down by landlords saying that she’d be a bad influence on the children in the house. “Once, a man actually had the gall to tell me that if he allows one man in the house, who knows how many I’ll bring in! A live-in situation is a no-no for Indians still and I learnt that early on during my visit there,” she says. Unsaid rules about dressing up also stump foreigners in the country. Hanna*, a Russian, says that she realized it early that not “only do you get stared at for being white-skinned but also for the short clothes that ‘help’ you show skin.” She doesn’t wear short clothes any longer. Hilda*, an American national married to an Indian, faced a similar situation when she went clubbing with her girlfriends in Delhi once. She said, “My in-laws were unhappy that we were going clubbing and told me that Indian girls don’t go out at night and dance with ‘strange men’.Even the men at the club would keep saying that let’s ask the ‘gori’ out. It was not a difficult thing to learn – Indian men see all girls, Indian or foreign as easy lays.” But, the discrimination doesn’t stop at the nightlife venues. As far as the professional sphere goes, it’s a different kind of bias that you face, says Hanna. “I feel women don’t get the more authoritative positions in offices even if they are as capable as the men who get them. I’ve experienced that here,” she says.*Names changed on request