32-year-old Saba Noor is riding her motorcycle. She’s part of the group of seven female traffic wardens patrolling in Lahore, the second largest city of Pakistan. Saba Noor has been in the police force in the past three years. She has just finished her two-month training with the other members of the traffic wardens group. They were trained how to control traffic and deal with emergency situation.
“At first, it was really difficult for me to learn how to control the traffic. But my family gives a lot of support. Now you’ve seen me controlling the traffic easily. We were trained about traffic rules, safety and of course traffic laws that most people in our country don’t know.”
This is the second female group of traffic wardens to control the traffic on the streets of Lahore.
In 2009, the female traffic wardens were stopped and transferred to office due to harassment on the streets.
29-year-old female traffic warden Sidra Saleem says people usually try to irritate them by stopping their cars or motorbike in front of them and passing abusive words.
“Despite the unwelcoming situation, we’re fearless. We will hold everyone equal before the eyes of the law. Senior officers have trained us how to deal with the situation. Most of the times, male wardens are there with us. Our first weapon is to ignore them and concentrate on the work.”
Women’s right activists welcome this as a step towards making Pakistan a better place for women.
But Bushra Khalid, the executive director of Women in Struggle for Empowerment (WISE), says she still have some concerns.
“I think it’s a good step towards women empowerment. As you know, our country women do not have equal job opportunity which they deserve. But a major issue for women is that harassment often goes unreported and unpunished.”
Sohail Chaundhry is the chief traffic officer who trained the female traffic wardens for the last two months before taking them to the roads. “I assure you that this time we will give full protection to the women. If there’s any complaint about harassment, we will take strong actions against the culprit.”
Riding a 250 cc motorbike… 27-year-old female warden Anna Aziz is passionate about her job.
“I think it’s a very important job. Not everyone is eligible for the job because there’s very little traffic sense and public jam is very common here. It’s our duty to reduce that.”
